Rogue
by Openhome
Summary: Rogue is the continuation of Coalescence. It is Alice and especially Jasper's journey through the Twilight Saga.  Jasper's past intermingles with his present as he comes to terms with himself and his choices.
1. Chapter 1

Hello and welcome to **Rogue**!

Before we begin, I must first thank three of the most supportive and critical people I know. My beta readers. Mistral123, Vanessa James, and Remylebeauishot are vital to me and to this story, and I can never repay what they have done for me. Thank you, ladies!

Any mistakes in grammar or storyline are entirely mine. Should you find mistakes, please do me the honor of pointing them out in a pm. I am always looking for ways to improve my story.

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I have often been asked to write a story about Jasper's past. I may do that some day. For now, we will be visiting his past as he tries to deal with his demons in the present.

**Rogue** is the continuation of Singularity and Coalescence and is Alice and Jasper's journey from the 1960's through Breaking Dawn. I will not be re-writing the entire Twilight Saga from their perspective, but rather showing the important parts of the story as it pertains to Alice and especially Jasper. Jasper, out of all the other Cullens, was the vampire most affected by Bella, and he is the one whose HEA was directly linked with hers.

I sincerely hope you enjoy the story.

_Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength, mastering yourself is true power ~ Lao Tzu_

The definition of Rogue is:

-no longer obedient, belonging, or accepted and hence not controllable or answerable.

-deviating, renegade, separated and solitary

In astronomy, a Rogue is a planet that has been ejected from its home and wanders the void of space until is gravitationally drawn to another stellar body, such as a singularity.

All Twilight characters and plot belong to Stephenie Meyer, and I thank her for her gracious attitude towards fanfiction writers like myself. I own original characters and plot, of which there is very little.

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_**Jasper**_

_**March, 1847**_

"No!" she yelled at the window. "No, he's too young!"

Of course, they didn't hear her; they were too far out in the field, and she was at the closed parlor window.

She raced out the door, her skirt instantly ruined by the mud flying up from the sloshing path.

"Will! Will Whitlock, _don't_!" she screamed. Her feet found little purchase in the muddy path, and she nearly fell several times as she struggled to reach her child. If her husband heard her, he didn't acknowledge it. To her horror, Will put her young son on the back of the horse.

"Will!" she screamed again, but her voice was hindered by her ragged breaths. "Will, he's just now four," she pleaded through tears that raced down her face. She was barely able to utter the words.

She tried to save her breath and run to her son's aid, but her feet kept slipping on the muck and her swollen belly threw her off balance.

She watched her young son's face, fearful but determined, and his tiny hands gripped the reins. And then her husband's hand came down on the horse's flank.

She froze, gasping for air in the cold, damp morning. Her breath smoked like a rail engine. She didn't even notice the wet cold that seeped into her calico dress. Her focus remained on the pudgy hands of her little boy as he gripped the saddle horn with all his might and thrashed wildly about on the back of the gelding.

Her father in law's hand came down on her shoulder. She turned to see that his face was as pale as the mist around her. He did not agree with his son's choice.

"Why?" she asked, her voice weak with her desperation.

"He needs to test himself, Molly," her husband called to her. Her eyes never left Jasper's small form as he was thrown about by the powerful animal's run. "You can't coddle the boy no more. It's time for him to act like a boy and not the girl you make him to be."

Jasper looked behind to her, his face terrified. He called out to her in shrill fear, "Mama, help me!" Instinctively, she raced forward, only to have her arm caught by her husband.

"He is too small, William. Damn you! You'll kill him by forcing him! You'll kill him! He isn't big enough for what you want him to do." She wrenched at her arm, trying to reach her son, but her husband held firm.

"Get control of him, son," William called to the child as the horse turned and nearly knocked the small boy off. "Calm him down and get control."

"Papa!" Jasper shrieked in terror.

"No, boy, you do this on your own. You are strong enough for this, boy. Don't you fail me!"

"William," hissed the Reverend. He came up and held Molly's arm in support. "This is insane. You're willin' ta risk your son's life for your pride's sake? Dear God, _help_ him."

William's face turned stone hard. "You leave me be. You'd have him be _weak like you. _You'd have him coddle folks and listen to their pathetic weeping. You'd have him show pity rather than strength. Did you see what he done with those dogs yesterday? He has a way with them, and with the people around him already. I won't let you make him weak and forever poor.; I won't let either of you do it."

Jasper called again to them. His tiny voice screaming for his mother as the horse carried him away. Molly sobbed and turned into the Reverend's chest, her swollen belly keeping her more distant than she wanted.

"Get control, boy!" commanded William, but the horse topped a hill and was gone.

Molly cried out and lurched at her husband. She pounded her hands on his chest, taking out her pain and anger on him. William grabbed her hands and held her tight. "It's not done yet," he hissed.

Molly fell heavily against him, her temper and energy gone. Her body quaked with sobs, and William's hands were the only things keeping her off the ground.

"Hush now," she heard her husband say over her sobs. "Hush now, you hear that?" Molly tried to still her breathing, and then she caught it. Horse hooves pounded towards them from the road. Molly wrenched herself free from William's grip and ran for the road. Just as she rounded the house, she saw him.

Jasper, caked in mud and red from the cold, was perched on the back of the horse, his small face triumphant.

"Mamma! Mamma! Didya see me?" He called. Despite herself, Molly looked at her son with a swelling pride.

"Jasper, oh my baby," she said, but she was too exhausted to take him from the animal who was now under his control. She simply stood there taking in the sight of her very alive little boy. She couldn't help but smile.

She slowly walked to her son, and he reached down to grip her tightly around the shoulders. She held him as tight as she could as she rejoiced in his return. Then, he was suddenly wrenched away. Her husband whooped as he pulled the little boy from her and threw him into the air.

"That's my boy!" he crowed triumphantly. "Just wait, Molly. You just wait and see what our little man will do." He turned and carried the child into the barn to clean him.

Molly stood there rubbing her belly and shaking from exhaustion and fear.

"You alrigh', Molly?" the Reverend asked.

"No, I don't think I am," she said, her voice hoarse from screaming.

"I'm sorry," the Reverend whispered. "He should have never have done that. He shouldn't push the boy so hard."

"What if this one is a son? What will he do then?" she asked.

"We will pray," answered the Reverend. He had no true words of comfort for her. His son was determined to push young Jasper as hard as he could, no matter the cost. The wide rift between himself and his son was created solely by his son's ambitions – ambitions that allowed for no scruples.

He held out his arm for Molly to take, and slowly helped her back to the warmth of her home. Her skin was blotched unhealthily, and he worried at her condition. He worried about the unborn child. He worried about his very young grandson who right now was laughing at his father's praise. The boy didn't even know the difference between love and the ugly lust of power that his father substituted for love.

As they passed the barn, Jasper's giggles calmed, and they heard his father's voice waft out of the cracks in the wood.

"…all the same, Jasper. Remember that. Dogs, horses, and men. They're all the same. If you can control one, you can control the other. You can use them all if you work hard enough."

Molly's breath hitched, and the Reverend hurried her towards the house, praying for a girl this time.

**March 6, 1963**

Her peace surrounded me as we sat under the ancient, twisting oak. The mist around us glowed pink with the rising sun. Once again, I wished for a slowing of time so that my endless life could somehow wrap itself around moments like this. But the day was coming regardless of my wish, or perhaps in mockery of it.

Days marched past us like ants in a line, each one the same and each one insignificant in itself. The only thing that mattered now, the only thing that mattered for the last fifteen years, was the small impish fairy who held me in the palm of her hand. Her love was the only thing that brought joy to the endless march of time.

"They truly are beautiful," Alice sighed, and she shifted in my lap to kiss my neck. I looked at her pristine face and smiled. There it was again, the unblemished joy of new love. Even now, it astounded me.

The sound of hooves drew my attention back to the meadow and small farm below us. The hills of West Virginia around our new home were filled with such places. I watched the horse run gracefully across the meadow, its mane, and tail still limp from the night's dew. Two others grazed lazily by the barn. The sight of horses had always given me an odd feeling of both comfort and belonging. I had ridden twice that I knew of. Other than that, I had no idea why they would mean so much to me.

"They are beautiful indeed," I said, admiring the animals.

"You rode them as a boy?" she asked. She always asked. She and Carlisle had a theory that coming to terms with my past would help me overcome my bloodlust. I had a theory that transfusing human blood into a deer would be far more successful, but Carlisle was unwilling to try it.

"At least once I did. I believe I was a young boy. My mother was proud of me," I said. "That's all I know. Honestly. That, and the fact that I rode one in the Cavalry." I only remembered sitting on a horse once while I fought, though even in the murky memory, the saddle seemed like home to me.

"Are you sure you can't make them come?" she asked plaintively. Each of us would have loved to touch an animal out of kindness, to pet and hold something, but it was impossible. I could get close, but never touch. No animal would allow that. Even sheep just keeled over and died from fear rather than allow one of us to get close.

At the same moment I felt the others come, the horses spooked and ran for the barn. Alice sighed, and we stood to await them.

As always, Edward was the first. "Sorry," he said with a glance at the now empty field.

"It's not your fault," I said. The scent of crushed grass lay heavy in the air.

Esme and Carlisle came up behind him. The family had gone shopping during my weekly hunting trip, but now gathered around us. This time, it wasn't in support of me, but of Emmett.

I was jealous of him.

Not many of our kind ever got this chance. Fewer of us wanted it.

I wasn't sure Emmett wanted it after feeling him come. He was a bundle of nerves. I automatically began soothing the vampire even before I could hear him. Both he and Rosalie needed as much of my help as I could give them.

"It's bad," I whispered to Edward. He just nodded at me.

Today, Emmett was going home.

Rosalie had already done so twice. Neither time gave her the peace she wanted. For Emmett, it would be considerably worse.

Carlisle had gone to the small mountain home to check first. His announcement that time was running out forced Emmett's decision.

His mother was coming to the end of her days.

Neither of them even greeted us as they entered the clearing. With a nod from Carlisle, we began our silent run up the mountains of deep Appalachia. The sun was barely behind a peak when we came upon the run-down homestead. A few sick looking cows meandered through a weed patch that might once have been a plowed field. Two goats were tied in what looked like had once been a garden. Beanpoles still stood, each one teetering in a different direction. The long hen house's roof sagged dangerously low at that backside, and as we watched, a rooster hopped out of one of the many gaps between the boards. The small barn was in a worse state.

The home had once been well cared for. The faded remains of cracked paint showed that long ago, it had been a bright yellow color. The windows were filthy, but each had a curtain, most of which were hand embroidered. Like the rest of the place, it lingered on the edge of death and decay.

Pain blazed from Emmett. This is why vampires did not go home again.

I pushed my peace into the large man. He simply stood, motionless except for his eyes. "I was here just three days ago," he said to the mist and decay around us.

For him, in his timeless state, it had only been three days since he last walked through this field. In reality, it had been almost thirty years.

"She is here," Carlisle said in his gentlest voice. "She isn't awake yet. It will take her a while to get moving with her joints swollen as they are."

Almost automatically, Emmett slowly walked towards the house. We followed him out across the open area that held the two ruts of the road. Once he stood before the entrance to the home, he froze in place.

While all the other windows were neatly trimmed with curtains, the two front windows hung with a different covering. Faded and lifeless, two starred flags hung from the wooden frame. Each one was covered with a now dingy gray swath of black fabric, the sign of two unbearable losses to the woman inside.

The man beside me blazed in agony, and his sob cut the morning silence.

"They died as heroes, Emmett. If you had, there would be three flags instead of two," Edward said to the unspoken thoughts.

"Two sisters and one brother yet live," Carlisle reminded him.

"It should have been me," Emmett hissed, almost vicious in his pain. Rosalie moved over to hold him.

"We can leave. It isn't always worth it," she said to him. "Trust me, it isn't worth it."

Emmett was already shaking his head. "I have to. Just this once. Just this once. "

I knew why, we all did. He had this one last chance.

He again approached the home, slowly as if to be somehow even more silent than he was. However, his movement panicked the animals around him. The chickens scattered among a ruckus of clucks, and the goats began to bleat loudly. Within the home, boards creaked and heavy feet shuffled across the floor.

Carlisle was instantly by Emmett's side. He put his arm around the terrified vampire. "She knows me. I will help her when she comes out. She is blind and won't know you are here."

Emmett shook with another deep sob, and the family moved to surround him. His mother was in heart failure according to Carlisle, and age had rendered her almost crippled. Arthritis had ravaged her body, and cataracts blinded her eyes.

The sound of children's voices and small feet brought us all out of our anticipation induced stupor, and we darted for cover in the thick overgrowth that crowded the far side of the two ruts.

"It's your nieces," said Alice. She gave Emmett an encouraging smile. "Apparently, they come to gather eggs and milk the goat. Do all the McCartys look alike?" she asked with a grin.

Within a few minutes, three girls came around the bend. One was a teenager on the threshold of womanhood, but the other two were still children. All three wore faded clothes more reminiscent of the last decade than this one.

"I says Mac just wants under your skirt, Maybelle. Like Mamma says, once he gets your legs apart, he will move on to another willing cow to milk," giggled the middle child. The youngest one burst into laughter.

"You take that back, Becca, or so help me, I will cut off those damn pig tails when you sleep," snapped the oldest girl. "Mac ain't none of your business, you got me?"

"I gonna tell Ma you swore," said the little one.

"You'll do no such thang," seethed the oldest. "You just get Mac outta yer minds. If ya know what's good fer ya, y'all will never say another word about him again. Ya got me?" She stormed off to the chicken coop.

"Told ya it was serious," sniggered the middle child. The youngest ran over to the porch and grabbed a milk bucket. "What's with these ninnies, anyway?" she asked in frustration as she tried to convince a terrified goat to stand still. I washed the field in the peace I'd been pumping into Emmett. The goat's head drooped.

We moved deeper into the woods, hoping to give the girls a chance with the farm animals. I felt Alice's hand in mine. She looked at me with a strange mixture of pride, anticipation and longing. This was the one thing that she would never have.

"They really do look alike," she whispered to me.

I looked over to Emmett. His eyes were fixed on the three girls. Each one had thick, curly black hair and gray eyes. The youngest girl had dimples that matched his exactly.

"They are the youngest girls of Liz," Edward said to him. "They have two brothers and a married older sister." Emmett didn't give any sign that he heard. Edward had more to say, but I could feel his uncertainty in telling it. I shook my head, and he nodded.

After ten more minutes of sporadic banter, the girls hauled the milk and a small basket of eggs onto the lopsided porch. The oldest one banged on the door while the youngest yelled out, "Mawmaw, we gots yer breakfast." Slow thuds made their way to the front of the home, and the door creaked open. Emmett moaned.

The woman who was still partly hidden by the door was haggard. Thick curls of white hair stuck up wildly from her head. Her face drooped, as did the rest of her body, and he she was nearly bent double with old age. Her eyes stared out blankly at the day, as white as the hair on her head.

"You young uns' are sure a blessin' to my mornin's," she said in a voice raspy and low. She hobbled aside, and the girls went in one by one. The youngest exited immediately and took a tin bucket to the pump to fill it. Smoke began to filter from the old stovepipe.

Emmett moved closer, coming to the very edge of the shadow. Rosalie pulled him back a bit. "You can't," she said, rare compassion making her voice lovely. "They can't see you."

"They are making her breakfast and telling her all about Mac," chuckled Edward. "They are a lively little group." We could hear most of the banter as well as the bangs and thuds of the girls as they helped their grandmother.

"Almost done," said Alice. "She will eat and come out in twenty minutes. It will be best if you don't go up to the door, Carlisle. Let her come out and then walk on the road to meet her."

The door opened, protesting the entire way, and the girls tumbled out onto the porch, still laughing from a rather crude joke their grandmother had made about Mac and Maybelle. Emmett got it honest.

Edward coughed next to me. "She's worse than he will ever be," he breathed so quietly that Emmett couldn't hear.

"Now, you make sure that boy keeps his hands on the outside of that pretty little dress," she said, pointing in a random direction. "Hands are always followed by other parts, and those get poked in bad places indeed." The old woman whapped Maybelle on the rump.

The two younger ones squealed in delight, and the oldest one turned deep crimson. "He's just a friend!" she protested.

"He must be a_ really_ close one, then. Close enough to get into your coat with you," laughed the middle one. The older one growled at her and leapt for her hair. The two girls took off at a dead run.

The youngest girl and her grandmother stood there laughing. I sent a wave of joy to the two of them.

"You go on now," said the white haired woman. "You gotta get to school, and I need my breakfast." The little girl nodded, and hopped off the porch and began skipping home. The old woman stood for a moment, breathing the morning air and then with a moan, painfully limped back into the home.

"Momma," whispered Emmett. He raised his hand as if to touch her, but it fell to his side as the door clicked shut.

"She is well loved and cared for," Carlisle said. I was pushing peace into Emmett so hard that everyone felt it. "She has had a very full life, and is ready for the end. She is also rather bull headed. She refuses almost all help. She even still rolls her own cigarettes."

Something shifted in Emmett. His pain and despair changed to resolve. "She won't refuse_ my _help," he said flatly.

"You can't do that," Edward said quickly. "Her heart won't handle it."

"I'm not going to tell her who I am," Emmett snapped back. "She's blind; she won't even know it's me. I gotta _do_ something. I can't leave her living like this."

"What is he planning?" Esme asked Edward.

"He wants to fix up the place," said Edward. "He knows better, but he is bound and determined to do it. You should know better, too," he reprimanded her when her smile spread across her face.

"She doesn't have to know we are here. We can fix the place up a little and leave. No one will know," Esme said, giving Edward a hard look.

"She's too stubborn. She won't accept any help," Alice said with her familiar, faraway look. "There may be a way, if Carlisle asks, though. Yes. He can get her to allow us to work on her yard."

"We can't do this," I warned. Visiting was bad enough; staying to fix the homestead would only prolong the agony that poured from Emmett. Besides, people would know that we'd stepped in.

"We already do do it," Alice snapped with a roll of her eyes. Edward sighed and hung his head. The argument was over.

"What do we do?" Emmett asked. He looked hopeful.

"Leave it to Carlisle and me! I know just what to do. Esme, your with me. Come on, Carlisle." With a flip of her head, Alice marched out into the sunlight. Esme walked happily after her. Carlisle resigned himself and strode out of the forest behind them. I looked at Edward, shrugged, and moved close enough to hear the conversation.

Alice and Esme talked together with Carlisle and positioned themselves on the far side of the home. Carlisle nodded and darted to the end of the road. We heard dishes clang and water being poured, then footsteps. The door slowly opened, and Emmett's mother stepped out onto the porch. The tree next to Emmett snapped as his hand constricted around the trunk, and the three of us grabbed it before it could fall and make any further sound.

The old woman stopped and cocked her head. None of us moved. After a moment, she began her slow, lumbering waddle to the edge of the steps. The thin rail shook violently as she lurched down.

Emmett put his hand out again, as if to steady her. Each heavy step caused his raw fear to grow. He was terrified for her.

For a moment, my mind went to the single vision of my own mother and her terror and pride as I rode a horse. I had no idea when I had done it, but the singular memory was important enough to remain after all others had faded away. Did my own mother end her days like this? Was she loved enough to be surrounded by her family? Did she die alone? It was suddenly important to me that she didn't.

A flutter of sadness followed by a flood of guilt came from Edward, and I altered my thoughts. He hadn't been able to save his mother. He had lost her while he lay dying of his own fever. This insane mission was now important to us both. Even Rosalie was touched by the old woman's struggle to walk to her overgrown garden.

She limped over to the ancient fence, and once her hand touched the rotting wood, she gripped it with all her strength. The thing leaned but stayed upright. Her breath came in rasping heaves, but she continued around to the back of the house, pausing only to pet the two goats. Each step she took caused the deep melancholy within her to grow. Without a word, we let down the tree we'd been holding and ran around the far side of the home to watch her.

Stooped nearly double, and limping badly, the woman continued her walk until she came to the one spot of the home that had been cared for. It was completely hidden by the overgrowth around it, but from our angle we could see clearly what it was. Emmett's hiss confirmed it.

It was a neatly tended flower garden, and in the middle of the newly grown morning glories, daffodils and cosmos, were crosses. There were at least two-dozen. Two frayed and faded ribbons hung on the fence, medals of some type dangling from the weak fabric.

"Good morning, boys," she whispered when her hands came to the medals. She bent down, her hand brushing against daffodils and what looked like lily leaves. "How are my babies? Is your daddy there with you, today?" She said nothing more, but weaved back and forth with closed eyes, communing with her dead.

Emmett gripped Rosalie and buried his head in her hair. She held her mate, bracing him as silent sobs shook him. I poured peace into him, and into the woman before us.

I had forgotten how deeply humans felt their losses and how hard they struggled with their mortality. I had forgotten what it meant to have a beating heart. With that thought, this old woman's life, the pain of her heart and body, which never left her, became important to me. It was stupid and illogical, but her welfare meant something to me. If I could help her with her ancient pain, I would.

Carlisle came around the edge of the old home. He paused to watch her, waiting until she was once again standing before talking to her. He walked closer, his steps now ridiculously loud to warn her. "Mrs. McCarty, how are you today?"

"Who is that?" she demanded.

"I am Dr. Smith," he lied easily. "I came by a week ago to check on your heart. Your doctor was worried about you. Do you remember?"

Anger blazed through her, anger and hurt pride. "Of course I 'member you!" she snapped. "I 'member all you government types. Y'all need to stay the hell out of my life!" I sent calm, and her breathing immediately eased. Carlisle looked to me, and I nodded.

"Doctor Harris is the one who sent me. He can't get out here any longer, and he wanted me to check and see how the medication was working. Your breathing seems better, and I see that you are able to walk again," he said, decades of practice making his words both unarguable and non-threatening at the same time.

"They worked, and I still have plenty of 'em," she said less angry but no less stubborn. "Made me pee like a horse, though." I felt myself smile. She was one feisty old lady. Emmett really did come by it honest.

"Diuretics will do that," Carlisle said with a chuckle of his own. "The pills remove all that water that was in your lungs and around your legs. It has to go somewhere."

She snorted. "Well it all went in a pot and then on that azalea bush right there," she said, pointing to a sickly looking bush that grew under what must have been her bedroom window. "I can't exactly make it to the out house all that often. You could help me more by moving the outhouse."

Carlisle smiled and looked at us. Edward moaned.

_Surely not. _

Alice stilled her giggle from the other side of the house, and I closed my eyes and tried to come to terms with helping a human with her biological needs. This was _not _what vampires were supposed to do, not even nice ones.

Carlisle couldn't possibly expect us to do that.

"I know someone who might be able to do just that," Carlisle said smoothly. He was enjoying the idea. That vampire was far too concerned with the bodily fluids of humans. Or at least the wrong ones. He put his hand under the mother's arm and held her steady as she weaved her way back to the front porch.

"Who the hell is going to move an outhouse for me?" she demanded. Her mood was lighter now. Despite her pride, she was glad for the company.

"There are two young ladies here to see you. I think they want to speak with you about repairing your home."

"I don't accept charity!" she yelled at him, stopping dead in her tracks and pulling her thick arm from his hand.

"It's not charity," said Alice. "It is repayment of a debt."

"You are talkin' nonsense," spit out the old mother.

"No ma'am, we aren't. Your son, Sam, saved our father's life during the war. We have been looking for your family for a long time to repay what we could of an unpayable debt." Esme answered this time, her voice clear and gentle. "Doctor Smith brought us with him so that we could try and help you somehow."

Emmett's mother's face instantly softened, and the barriers fell like rain. "My Sam?" she asked, her voice almost nonexistent. I worked to ease her tearing pain and to soften her heart. This would be much easier if she would agree to the help.

"Yes, Sam. He saved my father. My father always wanted to repay the debt, but he is too old now. We are here to do that instead." Alice spoke with her face completely blank, both talking and testing the future at the same time.

"You aren't from the government?"

"No, we are a family," answered Esme. That at least was the truth.

"I don't got no money fer repairs."

"Don't worry, we brought our own supplies," replied Esme. Her voice held that gentle lilt that was very hard to argue with.

I felt the woman soften. "Can you work in my garden? The rest of it don't matter none to me, but the flower garden, that's important."

"I would love to," Esme said with a genuine smile. She was truly in her element.

The woman nodded, and Carlisle led her back to the home. Emmett was already heading to the barn in search of tools. I doubted it would have many usable ones in it. Esme walked to the garden, and weeds began to fly.

"Oh, and tell them the right hole is cracked in that outhouse. If they can fix that'un, it would do my bottom side good," Emmett's mother said as the stairs creaked under her feet. "My grandkids don't like pullin' wood slivers from my hind quarters."

"Looks like we're on digging duty," said Edward with a grimace.

"I can't believe I am about to dig a hole for a woman's outhouse," I hissed. Never in a thousand years would I have ever considered the physical needs of a human. There was no reason to. There was no benefit in it.

Fifteen years ago, I would have gladly killed this old, blind woman, taking her blood in greedy gulps and convincing myself that I had done her a favor.

Now I was digging her a place to pee in comfort. And I didn't really mind it.

"It's a strange life," Edward joked with a wry grin.

"It's a stranger family," I retorted. He couldn't argue with that.

"Nope," he grinned at me. "It matters to Emmett," he said as the large vampire returned.

Perhaps that was the reason I didn't mind wasting my time with this old woman's farm.

"Don't forget, we need to fix the right hole, too," Emmett said as he tossed me a pick with a worn handle. He took the rusted shovel and began digging a hole just off the side of the porch. Esme would throw a fit, but it worked for old legs.

I swallowed my pride and tossed the pick aside. My hands would dig better any way.

"Make it deep, she drinks a ton of whisky, and that goes right through you. She really does pee like a horse," Emmett mumbled. I chuckled, but he glared at me. Apparently, it wasn't a joke. "Rosalie, why don't you grab the outhouse and bring it here?" he ordered.

Rosalie just stood there while her anger returned with a vengeance. Her face contorted into several different emotions, but to her credit she stomped over, gingerly lifted the rickety structure, and placed it beside the hole we were digging.

Better her than me.

Edward looked at me with a grin but said nothing as he shoveled.

Xx||oOo||xX

It took only a day to finish repairing the house and set the outbuildings right. Esme attacked the interior of the house while Emmett's mother slumbered in the evening. We worked to repair the outhouse and then went on to porch and barn. Esme would have spent weeks here, but there was no way we could risk that.

All day, Emmett simply worked. He never looked up and never spoke. He simply let the actions of his hands release the pain in his heart. We all let him do it.

It was at the edge of the small graveyard that Emmett finally spoke. Alice and I had been busy pushing the barn back into shape when she told me to go to Emmett. I looked over at him, and understood. Emmett stood there, his eyes locked on the old wooden crosses. The powerful vampire's shoulders were slumped in defeat.

I walked to him, sending him what I could, but he held his hand up. "I need to feel this."

I winced at his pain, but stood by him anyway.

"I carved two of them at least. Maybe more. I don't know anymore. I can't even remember which ones I carved," he finally said, indicating the crosses with his chin. His eyes remained on the rough wood that bore his own fading name. The bed creaked noisily from the thin wall of the house. "I need to go in, but I'm scared, Jasper. I'm terrified of what I will find. Of what I won't remember. Of what I was supposed to be."

"I reckon what you were supposed to be no longer counts for much. I never had this chance, and I don't know if I'd have taken it had it been given to me. I know what you are feeling, but I can't tell you what to do about it. The only thing I do know is that the mortal life is a fleeting thing, and we do not have many chances like this. Do you remember telling me that you were given this day? You should take this chance you have been given on this one day."

I saw Edward watching us. He nodded to the home. I already knew, of course, but I dreaded this. However, Emmett needed it.

On this strange day, I touched my brother's shoulder and tilted my head towards the house. He looked at me for a moment before heaving himself up and making his way by inches towards the home and memories of his past. I took one last breath of fairly clean air before going in with him. It was tainted with the scent of turpentine and paint.

Carlisle and Esme were inside. He was setting up medications, and she was finishing oiling the wooden walls that she'd sanded. Emmett didn't even look at their curious faces as he trudged up the stairs. His hands touched everything, though. His hands stroked every picture and every dent in the wooden walls, as if his stone hands could evoke memories. Or absolution.

With subtle precision, I began to gently ease his pain. I helped him feel the melancholy joy that the items brought him more clearly. I braced him for being close to his dying mother.

He walked into the door to the right of the stairs. There were only two rooms here, each facing the other. Both rooms were crowded with rough-hewn bed frames. Tumbled over these were hay mattresses and faded quilts.

"Never enough beds," Emmett said between heaving breaths. "There were never enough beds for us all." His hand went to small, parallel lines carved into the doorframe, names and dates on either side of each line.

He walked over to the quilts and shoved his face into the closest one to breath in the scent of long ago. Then he was gone. I raced downstairs to come in behind him and Carlisle in his mother's room. The room was filled with junk and memories. There were old, rusting items, whose uses I could only guess, cluttering the floor and crowding every surface. She slept sitting up, supported by pillows with her head lolled to the side. Even with her upright position and the medicines Carlisle had given, the water rattled thickly in her lungs.

Emmett's hand hovered over hers. I pumped whatever good thing I could into him, into the room. But there was no real way to help him. This was what he had wanted.

We waited for his decision. I felt Edward behind me, and Alice and Rosalie behind him. His cold, stone fingers brushed her hand, and then they whispered across her forehead to gently brush through her untamed hair.

"I'm sorry, Mamma. I done what I could. It wasn't enough, but it's all I got. It's what you said, you know. I done what I could with what I've been given." He leaned forward as he whispered the words, and he lightly kissed his mother's cheek. Her white eyes flew open, and she raised her hand to caress the spot he touched.

"Boy?" she asked to the dark, empty room. Emmett was too far away to hear it.

oo||xXx||oo

Alice said the girls would bring the entire family when they saw the repairs done to the farm, and we could not risk being anywhere near the house when they came.

Emmett didn't speak to us, nor we to him as we finished what we could and left. He gripped Rosalie's hand and strode off the ancient homestead, pausing only at the edge of the overgrowth for one last look. He took it all in, and I knew he was memorizing each blade of grass and every stone. Finally, he nodded and said, "Goodbye, y'all."

When he turned to run, the pain of his farewell was but a dull ache. I was truly jealous of him. For all the agony of his goodbye, I would have traded places with him. Gladly. I would have taken on any amount of pain to see my mother again.

We were home before sunrise. The old Colonial that Esme had fixed up for us in Elkins was a welcome site after the run-down human habitat we'd just repaired.

As we ran home, a new agony blazed. Alice did not look at me as she tried to stifle the feelings she knew I felt. She would have given anything for just the smallest clue to her life. I had been so focused on Emmett, that I had somehow missed the feelings in her, but she had also tried to hide them from me.

I waited until our much-needed shower to confront her on it.

When we reached our room, Alice silently undressed and got under the running water. She hadn't spoken to me since we'd left the farm, but I wasn't about to let her stay silent now.

I stepped in behind her, taking the soap from her tiny hands, and began to clean her perfect body. The feel of her skin slicked with soap always drove me insane with desire, but I stifled it and focused on her needs instead. Under my fingers, her body relaxed, and I felt her mood soften. At last, my Beloved leaned on me, letting my hands gently rub her shoulders and caress her neck. Then, I wrapped my arms around her and held her to me. "Why did you hide your feelings from me?" I asked.

"Emmett needed you. We all did," she said.

"Never hide from me like that, Beloved. Please, never do that." I began shampooing her hair, massaging her scalp as I untangled her emotions.

"I will be fine," she said, and her mood lightened. "I have the best family in the world, I have the most perfect mate in the world, and I will be fine."

Her slick body turned and pressed against mine. I forgot all about my resolve for a split second. Playfulness returned to her eyes, and she wriggled against me.

"Stop distracting me."

"I _like_ distracting you." She cocked her head to the side. "We couldn't have done it without you, you know. Emmett wouldn't have survived. I was so proud of you as you helped us all. You even helped his mother."

"I only did what I could. It took all of us to pull these last two days off," I reminded her. "We did work well together, though. It's strange how something so incredibly trivial can be so important."

Alice smiled and asked, "What do you mean by that?"

"Nothing we did mattered. Not really. If Carlisle is right, Maggie will be dead within a few weeks. The buildings, the flowers, the crosses, they will all rot and die and return to the state in which we found them. In a few short decades, the buildings will crumble. Nothing we did will last. Nothing we did truly matters, or at least it shouldn't. We accomplished nothing, but what we did meant so much. It is an odd thing, that's all." I looked at my mate, expecting to feel humor, but instead, pride flowed from her. I decided to tell her the rest. "There was something about the way the little girls reacted to their grandmother, about the way the old woman grieved over her dead, about the way that Emmett said goodbye that touched me. It reminded me of who I once was. I remembered the strength of what it means to be human."

Alice kissed me hard on the mouth, suddenly overwhelmed with joy. I let myself fall into her happiness and drown in it. Our lips and hands hungrily moved against each other, touching, tugging and pulling in the most suggestive way. "Why, Jasper," she said between kisses, "I do believe you're beginning to understand what it means to be a Cullen."


	2. Chapter 2

Thank you for your vampire-like patience for this chapter! To my betas, Vanessa James, Remylebeauishot, and Mistral123, thank you! You three ladies hold me together when my writing is falling apart!

Stephenie Meyer owns all of Twilight and it's toys. I'm just adding to the collection.

* * *

_**Alice**_

_**December, 27. 1963**_

I didn't enjoy spending my Christmas Break like this. There were far more enjoyable things to do than look at the art of dead people for hours on end. Of course we weren't just here for me. If Emmett and Rosalie could be patient, then certainly I could as well.

_This is for Esme_, I told myself again as we walked around the National Museum of Art for the second time today. _Esme deserves this, and she is enjoying herself and that is all that's important. _

_Is that woman wearing Dior?_

Edward laughed from the bay next to me.

Jazzy shot him a questioning look, and Edward formed the word "Dior" with his smirking mouth. My mate snorted and then became very interested in the Early American Masters in front of us.

"You two need to find some form of entertainment other than my _brain_," I hissed. "It's almost like you are obsessing over my thoughts."

"We only obsess over some of them," Jazzy said with a chuckle. I stuck my tongue out at him. Jasper grinned and backed away, his hands raised. "Not my idea," he said. "I can only play with your emotions. _He's _the one in your brain."

I glared at Edward who looked about as innocent as a fat snake. Suddenly, I realized their interest in my thoughts was likely prompted by something other than familial playfulness. They were playing some kind of twisted game.

"You!" I growled at Edward.

Behind him Emmett had his head twisted to the side trying to make sense of a Picasso, and he turned to meet my gaze with a look of utter confusion on his tilted face. I poked my finger at him, too, and glared for good measure. He just grinned at me and sniggered.

"I love it when the freaks play together," he said.

"Freaks retaliate in creative ways," Edward retorted. "Yes, precisely like that, only using skunks."

Emmett glared at him for a moment and went back to deciphering the abstract painters.

I turned on Jasper, ready to tell him to leave mr out of their little game, but I was drawn into his honey colored eyes instead. He was doing so well. It had been almost a year since his last human kill, and I was filled with pride and love for him.

Then I heard Edward groan and hit that beloved mate of mine. The sound of rock hitting rock filled the silent museum.

"Stop distracting me!"

He just gave me that frustrating half grin and walked over to the Impressionists.

I stormed after him only to come face to face with Carlisle and his raised eyebrow. I pointed at my retreating mate and then at Edward. "They are up to something," I explained.

"And this is different from normal in what way?" he asked.

He had me there. "Okay, I'll be more human," I acquiesced. I slid past Carlisle and a grinning Esme and rejoined Jasper who was absorbed in a French landscape.

"Oh, no you don't! What are you three up to, and why didn't I see it?" I hissed under my breath. I didn't know who I was angrier at, the boys or my fickle, treacherous visions.

"Not me. I'm just a participant," Jazzy hedged.

_Edward!_

"Nope. I'm just taking down tally marks," he whispered so that only we could hear him.

_Don't think I won't get you back for this. _I pictured his precious Studebaker with a dead deer perched behind the wheel. I would make sure it had rotted in the sun a while first.

Edward hissed a warning.

"What are you three up to?" I demanded of my mate, looking every ounce the vampire I was.

He broke out laughing. I stomped my foot in frustration.

"…just so cute when she's angry," Emmett laughed. I was just about to launch myself at him, when human footsteps forced me to back down. A docent walked briskly by leading a man with overly long hair and a sharp goatee. He smelled of oil paint and turpentine and had on a designer Italian jacket made of black leather. His haute couture boots matched it nicely.

"Boots," snorted Edward as he rolled his eyes. Emmett heard him and sniggered.

Oh, I was going to burn someone!

This had to be Emmett's idea. I could take all the screws out of that ornate bed of theirs. For that matter, I could weaken the foundation of the carriage house they lived in.

"I'll help," whispered Edward.

_You are still on my hit list, too, mindleach. You just watch yourself._

I focused on the cityscape in front of me and looked to the future for some clue to the present. I could clearly see us dancing at a club and then driving to Atlantic City tonight. I could also see us in the casinos tomorrow. There was nothing out of the ordinary.

None of the boys looked like they were doing anything other than being their naughty selves. Then I caught one glimpse. It was still very hazy and uncertain, but it looked like Esme was gloating over something while the boys moped. That wasn't out of the ordinary either, but it was odd for such a short trip.

I glanced at Edward, and the set of his mouth told me all I needed to know.

He wasn't happy that Esme might win. His eyes narrowed at me.

_You know it will happen. _

I hoped smugness came across loud and clear in brain waves.

"What?" Jazzy asked.

"You lose. Whatever it is, you lose," I purred at him.

I decided to go and visit the watercolors next. Jazzy was still glaring at Edward when I turned the corner. I decided to go along with the game, whatever it was, and enjoy the fashion sense and non-sense of the thin crowd. The fashions of the mid sixties were better than the Depression, but only just a little. I was partial to the minimalist French designers, but their American counterparts simply couldn't match the balance and lines that the French so easily mastered.

Of course, I still missed the Twenties.

A large woman walked by me, her dress nothing more than a hideous moo moo, but her deep red hair was swept up into the most amazing top bun. I was jealous of her. My own hair was currently laying flat against my scalp and held in place by a headband. Maybe I should give wigs a try as Rosalie had suggested. They were in fashion now.

"…not in the rules," whispered Emmett from behind me. They had followed me.

"There are no rules," snapped Edward. "Shhhhh. She can hear us."

"Don't look at me like that, it wasn't my idea," retorted Jasper.

"I told you to aim high," Rosalie blurted out to some whispered thing. I made up my mind to attack the bed as soon as possible. Dye in the shower head was also a possibility.

Edward snorted again.

"What?" the three others hissed.

"Nothing." I saw an image of Edward and I unbolting their bed while Jazzy unscrewed the shower head.

_Thanks for the help._

I spotted Esme and Carlisle over in the corner looking at a Rembrandt, and joined them. He looked positively dashing in his ascot neck tie. And the periwinkle dress brought out Esme's lovely hair.

"Oh, now she is just flaunting it," Edward snapped.

"The Dutch masters have always been favorites of mine," Carlisle said, not taking his eyes off the painting. "Most of them were self-taught. I have always admired that."

"Did you know him?" I asked. Two women walked by, and I noted the burnt orange color of one's scarf matched the earthy brown blouse she was wearing perfectly. Then I realized that I'd done it without even thinking about it.

Drat.

I would have been angry at myself, but I was too busy memorizing the pendant necklace the older woman wore.

"No," said Carlisle, pointing to the painting's date. "We were contemporaries. I was in Europe at the time of his death, and the Volturi have several of his paintings, but I wasn't able to meet the master."

Esme lay her head against Carlisle's chest as she examined the painting. "Thanks so much for coming here with us," she said, slipping her arm around Carlisle's side and facing me. "I know it isn't shopping or dancing, but I do so enjoy a walk through a museum."

"You're welcome. Can we go try the dancing now?" blurted Emmett.

Carlisle looked at his watch in a useless human motion. We all knew that it was almost six and safe for us to leave the building.

We gathered our coats from the nervous concierge, and headed into the evening. My arm found my mate's and I squeezed his hand. Then I squeezed it harder.

"Whose idea?" I mouthed silently to him when he turned to look at me.

"Sworn to secrecy," he whispered back.

"Esme wins. How secret can it be?" He just smiled at me. I decided to bide my time. We were heading to Atlantic City, and that place had some of them most wonderful items for wrenching the truth from any man. With the right purchase, Jazzy would be nothing more than stone-hard putty in my hands.

x||oOo||x

"Don't get me wrong. I don't mind being here, but I simply don't know why we _need_ to be here. I still have about a dozen of these things left over from our last trip," Rosalie said as she whipped through the lingerie hanging from the rack. "Besides, the catalogues have a much better selection, and they're more creative. I prefer costumes." She dismissed the rack and went over to hosiery.

I surveyed the shop quickly, not seeing the black leather items that had flashed through my head when we passed the place. We didn't have long here; the others would be done at the book store within a half hour.

I walked over to the busty woman behind the counter. She was reading and tugging absently at the stretched out neckline of her too tight sweater. She jumped when I cleared my throat, and her cleavage threatened to burst out of it's confinement.

"I need something a little more racy than these items. Maybe something, um, assertive." She just looked at me. "Leather and metal?"

"Ah," she said with a nod. She motioned to a closed door, and I quickly went in. The smell of oil, metal and leather fairly assailed me there. The place was a picture of chaos. Even I couldn't imagine uses for most of the items before me. However, I did know what the thigh high boots and chain link with leather bustier and panty set could do - if used properly. I snatched up the items I needed and began to exit, when another thought struck me. I grabbed a set for Esme. So long as she won whatever contest they were having at my expense, she might as well get a prize.

I giggled as I took the purchase up front. Esme was going to kill me.

x||X||x

Gambling in Atlantic City is very formal and elegant. It was quite different from Las Vegas. Even the entertainment seemed classier, or at least less feathered. We dressed the part, with the boys in short waistcoats, and us girls in short A-line dresses. We each played our chosen games or watched the various musical acts, and then returned to the top floor of the Trymore to spend the evening and the sunny part of the next day happily secluded with our mates. Edward didn't join us, and tonight, that was a good thing.

I went ahead of Jasper to the room to set the trap. I started with rose petals strewn about the floor and then moved on to the scented oils. Jasper loved those. I used them a little too liberally on myself, and the metal from the tiny lingerie set kept sliding down my stone body, but perhaps that was for the best. I was here for information, not propriety.

Jazzy was just opening the door as I zipped up the leather boots. I glanced in the mirror and was rather shocked at the image of my body. Propriety was definitely not an option tonight.

I felt Jazzy's mood change as he walked in. Joyful anticipation and raw desire filled the room.

"Whoa."

I smiled seductively.

"Edward's not here, right?" he asked. He walked slowly towards me, circling for a better look.

"No, he left about an hour ago." Thank God. He did not need this image. Ever.

"This is… well, it's… I don't think there are words," he stuttered.

It was working perfectly. I put my foot up on the chair next to me, and smiled as his bulging eyes swept to the right area.

"It's not for you," I stated simply.

He froze. I laughed and turned to see myself in the mirror. Just for effect, I wiggled my very exposed bottom. "I was just wanting to see how it looked before watching some T.V." I motioned to the bathroom. "You can have a nice cold shower and watch with me if you want." I looked back over my shoulder at my mate's incredulous face. His mouth had dropped nearly to the floor.

"You wouldn't," he said. His deep voice squeaked.

I laughed and hopped onto the bed, with my legs tightly crossed. His eyes narrowed, and I was washed in raw lust so powerful that I nearly folded, but I'd been his mate a little too long for that to work.

I squeezed by knees together and grinned at him. "Oh, yes, I would."

"This is blackmail."

"It's extortion, actually. I wonder if they broadcast anything but children's shows this time of day. I'm in the mood for the 'Beverly Hillbillies.'"

Jazzy made an odd gurgling sound.

"Or maybe 'Gilligan's Island.' That show always puts me in such a happy mood." I slowly sat up and crawled forward on the bed, giving my husband what I knew were some very interesting angles. When I reached the edge, I put my fingers in his waistband and tugged just a bit. "Would you turn it on for us?" My fingers fell gently down his pants as I looked at him innocently.

"You are evil," he growled out between clenched teeth.

I laughed and rolled over on my back, laying spread eagle in front of him. "Yes. Yes I am. It comes with the whole 'living dead' and 'spawn of Satan' thing." I ran my finger under the strap of my barely there bra. "Chain mail is itchy."

"I promised," he whimpered.

"Break it or turn on the T.V, bucko."

He wavered for a moment, but I knew he couldn't hold out much longer. The room was filling with desperation.

"It was all Carlisle and Esme's idea," he finally blurted out.

"Liar."

"No, honestly. Carlisle wanted to know how to get around your gift, just to know its weakness. It was a good tactical move." His eyes never looked into mine; they were roaming over my body.

"And?" I prompted. I stretched my arms over my head.

"Have Mercy," he whispered. "Lord, woman, you are going to be the death of me!"

"I don't mean to kill you Jazzy, just cause you a little pain. Now tell me what you all were up to."

He wavered for a moment, and then caved in completely.

"Carlisle thought that a plan that didn't involve you might be hidden from you. So Esme suggested a contest. Each one of us put a number in an envelope, and then Edward counted the number of times you were distracted by clothing or jewelry. The closest one to the right number wins." He looked at me, his eyes pleading for mercy. He was so cute when he did that.

He took a step forward, and I growled.

"You are not off the hook yet, mister. When does this contest end?"

"Last night at midnight."

"Esme definitely wins," I said. Jazzy looked even more dejected.

"Damn it! That means we re-roof the house when we get back. Did you figure it out?" he asked, a flicker of hope in his eyes.

"What you were counting? Of course I did."

"Good, at least I won that one. I told them you would figure it out. I know better than to bet against you."

I smiled, no longer feeling the least bit guilty for what was about to happen in Carlisle and Esme's room.

"I got her back for you," I said. "I gave her a matching outfit." I wiggled on the bed to let the light catch on the metal loops.

"I didn't need that image," Jazzy said with a shudder.

"And I don't need any more visions telling me what happens next," I said. I arched my back and looked at my mate. "You owe me big time. You need to keep my mind from seeing what will be happening down the hall."

He immediately lit up. Just then, a screech rang out, and we heard Carlisle whistle. "Alice!" Esme roared, but Carlisle's gentle tone was already calming her down. It turned pleading within a few words.

"Oh, good, he likes it," I said with satisfaction.

"That's going to cause a fight," Jazzy said with a chuckle.

"I know. Carlisle wins. Now, come over here and get those images out of my head."

"With pleasure, Mrs. Whitlock." He paused, looking like a naughty boy again. "Um, first, could you growl again for me? The metal is particularly attractive on an angry woman."

I growled fiercely and went into a crouch for him, and just before I sprang, I saw that we were going to imbed these little loops deeply in the wall.

oO||xXx||Oo

_**September 18, 1964**_

"Don't worry about them," said Emmett with a mock grin. He was angry, and I could see it in his eyes, but he still tried to hide it.

I looked back at the girls who were still huddled in a vicious circle. Last year, they avoided me, but this year they taunted me. If Jasper knew the things they said, we wouldn't have been able to keep him from their throats.

"They are only jealous," said Rosalie as she glanced at her reflection in her compact.

I missed Edward at times like this. He would have been able to tell me their true thoughts.

Of course, he would have also told me that I was being silly and trite. I was over sixty years old, though my memory only spanned forty-three years.

"What do they say?" asked Emmett as he watched my face in the rear view mirror.

"They call me all kinds of names – freak, oddball, creepy, crazy. I just don't understand why they have chosen me to torment," I said, trying to keep my misery out of my voice. It _was_ trite, but it also hurt. It hurt far more than it should. Of course, I'd tried to let it slide past me, but somehow their digs stung me, and I couldn't easily let it go. It didn't help that I could kill them with a flick of my finger.

"They don't like me either," Rosalie reminded me. I kept my thoughts on that one to myself. She continued when I didn't say the biting words that were on my tongue. "They really aren't worth your time, anyway. It's not like you can have one as a friend. In thirty years, they will all be fat with droopy chins and stretch marks. You will be perfect, just as you are now."

"And still a sophomore in high school," I mumbled. Rosalie had hit on my real issue. None of them could be my friend. For as much as I loved my brothers, enjoyed Rosalie and adored Esme, I wanted a friend. It really was quite childish.

"Yeah, but you will be an old sophomore with really great boobs," teased Emmett with a wicked smile. He was proud of himself.

Rosalie hit him. "You are lucky Jasper isn't here."

"Or Esme," I added. Emmett's eyes flashed at me. He was truly afraid of that gentle woman.

"It's true, though. They're little, but perky," he continued with an innocent expression on his still wicked face. Rosalie hit him again. I would have attacked him from behind, but I was still too upset.

I needed to calm myself within the next fifteen miles, or Jazzy would be ready to kill those fifteen-year-olds.

The truth was that I missed Emily. I even missed the New York covens, or at least I missed the friendships we once had. I cursed immortality when I realized that Emily was now in her forties. The toddler I'd seen in her last picture was on the verge of adulthood. Jasper was right, human life was a fleeting thing.

With that thought, there was no way to come out of my sour mood without my mate. It was frightening how much I needed him. I counted power poles as I waited for his healing.

I felt him before I saw him, and his presence washed away the deep ache I always felt but didn't perceive until he was near. We rounded a corner, and there he stood. His face relaxed when he saw me, and my smile burst onto my face. Even in my bad mood, the joy was indescribable as I fell in love all over again.

Emmett snorted and stopped the car for me. I was out before he finished his crack about sneaking back into the house naked after a night of romping in the woods.

He'd never actually seen us do it. He was always too busy with Rosalie by the time we snuck home.

Jazzy's arms surrounded me, and his joy joined with mine. He snuffed out my sour mood as easily as blowing out a small flame.

"Better?" he asked into my hair as he took in my scent.

"Hmmm, much." I pressed my face into his shirt, and felt his muscles contract around me. What felt like granite to the world, felt like a soft haven to me.

"It was that bad?"

"Yes," I said simply. I wanted to tell him how much it hurt to be rejected by young humans, but I was afraid for them and ashamed of myself. I really was too old to be acting like this.

"I would join you if I could," Jazzy said with a guilty twang to his words. I grimaced. Part of my issue was that I truly missed my mate when I was at school. It was painful. When Edward was there, I wasn't the odd girl out, but he was at college this time getting his medical degree.

"Maybe for your senior year…" Jazzy began. I put my hand over his perfect lips to stop him.

"You aren't ready yet," I said with a smile. He tried to hide it, but high school was torturous for him, and his resolve was still too weak to risk it.

"That was almost six months ago," he said, glancing at me and then looking away. His shame at his last killings radiated through me and lingered on his voice.

I wanted his statement to be reason enough as well, but the truth was that those three men could have been anywhere. The fact that they were far enough away to be no danger to us didn't make his accident any less problematic. He had lasted almost nine months without human blood, the longest he'd ever gone, but his slip erased all the progress in in instant. It was so quick that I didn't even see it until it was over.

We'd had to move our move here up by three months because he had accidentally killed in Ann Arbor.

No. Jasper wasn't ready yet.

"I will be fine, Jazz. It was just a long week. Now that we are together, it will be fine."

He held me tightly for a moment, and in that sweet stillness, he healed my heart. He was just so good at it. "You bring me such peace," I whispered into his shirt. He laughed. He really didn't understand the magnitude of it. "I want to take you somewhere. Somewhere away from here," I said.

He smiled knowingly at me. "We _can_ just go. The forest is lovely this time of year, and we could stay a little longer after the hunt. Just the two of us. I have a couple of bags packed," Jazz said. He motioned to two duffle bags that were hidden in the forest. "Edward mentioned that you might do well with a short trip, so I planned one for us. We can be back for the movie in plenty of time," he pushed. We'd promised Emmett that we would all see James Bond together. As much as I wanted to be with my family and needed to be with Edward, though, I needed to be with my mate even more.

I looked ahead and saw that Emmett and Edward would be wrestling in the shade of the trees. Esme would somehow convince Rosalie to get into the garden with her. They were fine.

"Esme said it's okay," Jazzy continued. I knew the family would keep Edward busy. I smiled at the prospect of some alone time.

"I might even be too sick for school. I will definitely be too sick for that movie," I said, the idea had my mind wandering in some very playful directions.

He smiled at me, stooped to pick up the knapsacks beside him, and we were off.

Fall in the Appalachian mountains brought familiar comfort to me every time it rolled around. The forest was alive with swaying color, and the earth smelled of harvested crops.

"You are still sad," Jazzy said beside me.

"It's been a long year," I said with a shrug. I looked over at him. His beauty still caught me off guard. We were laying at the top of a waterfall after a day of loving, and he was a miracle of light and perfection. The orange rays of the setting sun gave him a golden hue. He smiled and reached up a hand to stroke my cheek.

"Emmett is doing well, and Edward will come around. There will be someone for him," Jazzy reminded me.

"The years are dragging on him."

He nodded. "They weighed on us all. It was eighty years for me and almost three hundred for Carlisle. These things can't be rushed. When he finds her, he will be a new man."

"I know." I did know. Carlisle, Jasper, me and Edward. We had all waited. We knew. "I am still amazed Carlisle lasted so long. I wish I had seen his face when he realized Esme was his mate. It must have been glorious." I smiled at the thought. If ever two people deserved each other, it was them. "Some never find one," I said, finally admitting my fear. I had been looking for years, but no vision ever came of Edward's mate.

"He is a good man. He will find a woman, and it isn't your responsibility to try and see the future of every single female you meet to get a head start. He finds that annoying, you know."

"If he doesn't want to be annoyed, he should stay out of my head," I grumbled.

"Your head gives him hours of entertainment," he laughed. It had taken a decade, but Jazzy had finally accepted our odd relationship. In fact, he enjoyed the constant banter between us, so long as I told him what was happening after.

"It really does annoy him when you try so hard to find him a mate," Jazzy began, but my mind was overtaken by the near future.

I saw Esme and Rosalie washing off muddy garden tools when they suddenly both whirled on something. Carlisle and Edward came running from the house, fear and concern etched in their faces.

"Is there danger?" Jazzy's voice was rough and commanding as I emerged from the vision.

"We have to go back," I said rapidly, trying to get a hold of what I'd seen. "Something scared Rosalie and Esme, and Carlisle came running from the house." I was already up and snatching clothing from the bag. In my haste, I split the canvas material in two.

"Is there danger?" Jasper asked again. He hadn't moved from his spot.

"We have to go back," I said firmly, but he simply looked at me.

"I won't take you back until I know what is happening."

"This is our f_amily_," I snapped at him. The vision replayed itself in my mind. "They need us now." I pulled on my clothing and glared.

"Look and see, Alice. Running back in when we don't know the issue will only make things worse." He gripped my shoulders, unmoved by my plea.

"Jazzy, _this is our family_!"

He took a breath, but his hands held me firmly. "Alice, I can't have you in danger, and we can't help them if we don't know what to do. Stop and take the time to see. Running into an unknown situation is suicide. We can't help them if we are dead."

I knew he was right, and I also knew that this was more than he could be asked to do. He couldn't run into danger if I was with him. He could not cross that line.

I tried to loosen my tight chest, which seemed bent on constricting over the silent hole there, as I quieted my mind, and hoped that the clear vision was far enough away to give us time. This time, the vision was longer, and I could see that the sun was almost set in it. Two hours perhaps. I willed it to go on. Carlisle ran from the house with Edward beside him, and I saw the fear shift to disappointment and sorrow. I forced the vision on, and then I caught it. Edward ran to Emmett, and when the large vampire looked up, his eyes were crimson.

The silent hole sunk as I realized what had happened.

"Are we too late?" demanded Jazzy, reading the grief in my emotions.

"Emmett has killed someone," I said in a flat voice.

Jazzy relaxed immediately, the warrior melting out of him as he understood the news. I felt him lift my disappointment.

"It is to be expected," he said gently. I wanted to tell him he was wrong, but I knew better. I watched him as he dressed himself. "You are right, though; they do need us." He picked up the few scattered items and stuffed them into his pockets. "And they are family. I haven't forgotten that."

"I'm sorry. I saw them, and I simply needed to reach them," I said. I took his hand. "We have a plan, and I should have followed the plan."

Jasper's hand held mine tightly before we began our rapid run back to the house that could no longer be our home.

o||X||o

Jasper began calming the home before we reached it. They needed it.

Even though accidents were a part of what we were, they always struck the family hard. Any other vampire would think we were insane by being upset over a single human life. But we based our lives on keeping the humans around us alive.

"Go to Esme," Jazzy whispered to me as we entered.

The living room was in chaos. Esme standing on the mantle over the massive stone fireplace pulling down the few art pieces that she moved from home to home. Carlisle was on the phone in his study talking in a low voice with a real estate agent. Edward was counting out money on the dining table, and Rosalie was draped over her mate who sat crumpled on the couch. Jasper went to stand behind them, and I jumped up on the mantle beside Esme. She was trembling.

I felt the powerful calm creep through the room, and was again grateful for the subtle power of my mate.

"Let's gather the pieces from upstairs," I said as quietly as I could. Esme looked at me and nodded. As soon as we entered her bedroom and shut the door, the quiet words fell from her like petals from a rose.

"She was an older woman. Five children. She was hanging out their washing in the breeze. Five children, Alice, and the youngest is only about eight."

"Emmett didn't mean to do it. He wouldn't have hurt her if he'd known what he was doing," I reminded her. We had all killed. All but Carlisle, though he still considered what he'd done for his wife and children a type of death.

"I know." She looked at me with a guilty expression and then listened for a moment to the silence below. "I know, but it still hurts all the same. Emmett said that the scent of the blood drove him mad with thirst. Carlisle says that it can happen, that the blood of a human can be utterly irresistible to us. We become the monster when it happens, as if we have no choice."

"No choice," I echoed. How often were we at the mercy of the monster we loathed? "Is it… taken care of?"

Esme sucked in air and nodded. "They put her in her vegetable garden, and Edward broke the axle on the old tractor. The tractor was on a hill, and it will look like a horrid accident." She laughed, and I knew why. It was truly more horrid than any human would ever guess. "Poor Emmett was just running to the five and dime for Rosalie. He didn't need this after his mother."

I rubbed her back and thought about the man downstairs. The last year and a half had been especially hard on him.

"The money is for the family?" I asked.

"Fifty thousand. It should be enough to help them. Edward has to do it this time. He will dress up as a young insurance agent and give them the cash. Carlisle knew the family; they only live ten miles away, and he treated the children, so he cannot go," she said, her voice shaking at the end. I put my arm around her and hugged. She squeezed back and then walked over to take down the painting I'd given her. "Carlisle is making arrangements. While Edward gives the money to the family, he will grab the trucks. We need to be ready by tomorrow at noon."

"Calgary?"

"Yes. Carlisle is buying a ranch there. We will start up again in school right away. Canada should be good for us. The boys won't need to fear the draft, and it is cloudy there. Besides, what could happen to us in Canada, right?"

I looked ahead. I could see us cleaning a low, stone home in a mountainous region. It seemed peaceful enough. "It has only one story," I told Esme.

"We can use the logs from the area to build a second floor," she mentioned offhandedly. "I never got to learn to quilt. Silly isn't it? I wanted to learn those complex patterns, but now I can't, and I'm _sad_ about it. A woman is dead, and I'm upset about quilts."

"That's the way it is for us, isn't it? Whenever our vampire side comes in contact with the human side, it's always the human side that is hardest to control."

"We will be fine, won't we," she said. It was a statement.

"We will be perfectly… normal… for us," I said with a shrug. She gave me a half smile. "Canada might be a nice break for us. The food there will be easier to find and more fun to catch. Yes, I think it will be a good move. We should get the small stuff down and then tackle the beds," I suggested. I could see Emmett and Rosalie going to their room to pack. It would be best to keep busy now.

x||O||x

"Stop complaining about it and just walk," hissed Rosalie to Emmett's sulking form. "At least we can go to the theater during the daytime here."

Emmett just huffed and strode forward. It had been a week since his accident, and he hated wearing sunglasses. He hated having us crowd around him. He especially hated the way I was constantly looking to his future, but we all knew how easy it was to slip with human blood still in the body.

"I said 'From Russia With Love.' I wanted to see a Bond film, not _this_!" he spat at us.

"Well, it's not playing in Seattle right now. _This _is what is playing in Seattle right now. You wanted to stop and see a movie to lift your spirits, remember?" Rosalie's patience with her whining mate was at an end.

Jasper was grinning beside me, and I knew he wasn't about to interfere. He enjoyed their little spats.

Emmett halted in his steps. "Trust me, this film will _not_ lift my spirits."

"Oh, come now, Emmett," said Esme, who was very excited about seeing the film. "It has Dick Van Dyke and Julie Andrews in it. You can't go wrong with those two."

"It's a damn _musical_," he hissed, almost gagging on the last word.

"I don't know," drawled Jasper who was truly enjoying himself. "I think a musical would do you good right about now. I've heard 'Mary Poppins' is fun for children of all ages. And deep down, you love singing nannies."

Edward laughed, and Emmett whirled on them both.

"I am about to rip you apart over a singing nanny, you know that, right?" he growled, glowering at them both.

"If you boys don't stop this, we will get right back into the cars and keep driving to Canada," Carlisle warned them sternly. We all held back our laughter. Carlisle sounded just like Ward Cleaver from 'Leave it to Beaver.' I missed that show.

Emmett huffed and turned on his heel to get in line for the matinee. Several people in the crowd backed up instinctively when he and Rosalie stepped up to the ticket window.

I was distracted for a moment by a heated discussion at the used car lot across the street. A rather weathered looking man in plaid flannel was arguing with the salesman about the price of a cherry red pickup. From his clothing and size, the man must have been a lumber worker.

"…not bringing my price down that much," the salesman was saying. "This truck will last for _decades_. It's the only one that can handle the lumber trails in the Cascades. You won't find a beauty like this at a price like this any time soon."

The lumberman began to argue, but his voice vanished as a flash of a vision took me to a thick, green forest. Looking out from some type of porch, I saw the truck lumber up an overgrown drive. The vision was hazy and nothing more than a glimpse, but the truck looked much older, and the cherry red had faded to a dull brick color. I couldn't see the driver, and for some odd reason, that bothered me.

"You're seeing trucks now?" Edward chuckled.

I cringed and shrugged. My visions were so useless sometimes.


	3. Chapter 3

All of it belongs to Stephenie Meyer, and I thank her for her continued grace in letting us all post our stories.

_**Hallelujah, I can post again!**_

I am so sorry for the delay in this chapter. It was ready at the beginning of March, but I couldn't log into my account. I didn't realize until last week that this was a problem with others as well. So, FINALLY, here is the next chapter of Rogue.

A huge thanks to Abbyweyr for her excellent beta help!

* * *

_**Jasper**_

_**Fall, 1851**_

The heavy set older man hobbled among the boulders that were strewn about the gully as though they had once been marbles tossed by a wayward giant. Though he limped badly, he made his way amongst the maze of rock and water surely, for he knew the way to his hidden pool by heart. The limp was caused by injuries that were sustained long ago, and though he was unsteady, he compensated for it well.

Ahead of him, a lanky boy waited impatiently. Normally, the youth would have been running ahead or leaping from boulder to boulder, but today his shoulders slumped under the bamboo rods, and his bare feet kicked divots in the sand.

To Reverend Whitlock, the man-child looked utterly defeated.

The boy's mood even dispirited the dogs that loped along side of them.

"I'm a comin' boy," he huffed. "These ole legs have a hard time in rough places." After decades of being far from the bayou, the cadence of Louisiana still played through the deep Texas drawl, especially when he was relaxed.

"T'sallrigh, Pappaw," the boy said, almost too quietly to be heard. "I ain't got nowhere t' be teday, anyhoo."

The Reverend reached the lad and clasped his shoulder with a strong hand. "Don't let them get you down, boy," he said, his deep voice echoing off the rocks and filling the gully. Two of the dogs nuzzled the boy, almost as if they had been affected by the old man and were now, too, trying to lift his spirits. "You lost a fight. T'ain't a grand matter. We all lose 'em from time to time."

"It'll be a grand matter to Pa," spat out the boy. He looked down at the older man, for he was almost a head taller, and then looked away quickly.

Reverend Whitlock knew the boy was right; the boy's father would see this loss as a sign of weakness, and he did not take kindly to weakness.

"Tell me, boy, why'd you fight 'em? Couldn't you tell how badly it was going?"

The boy walked silently beside him for a while, and the Reverend didn't push. Talking openly about Jasper's emotional frailty wasn't an easy thing.

They came up to the small bend in the river that hid the pool. It was a secret spot, hard to get to, but worth it.

Surrounded by rocks and high cattails, the pool lay completely hidden from the world. It was a place of solitude, and the Reverend, who normally loved people, sometimes needed solitude.

The dogs rushed ahead through the cattails but didn't disturb the water. Much.

They wove around through the giant bushes until they came to a flat rock. The place was beautiful in its utter stillness.

The river flowed through the pool so that muck and slime had no real chance to gain a foothold, but the surface of the water remained as smooth as glass. The deep blue sky and bright white clouds reflected perfectly in the water. Both the man and the boy sighed when they saw it.

They set to work with the bamboo poles and soon had a pair of skewered worms in the water. When they were both seated, watching the sunlight dance across the odd wave, the Reverend brought up the fight again.

"You knew it wouldn't end right, didn't ya'?" he asked. The dogs came near him. He was trying to soothe his grandson, and the dogs always wanted to be near him when he tried to ease the pain of another.

Jasper shrugged against him. "I thought they'd listen to me. I thought I could stop 'em. They both turned on me and started sayin' horrible things about me. They said almighty awful things about our family. That's when I got mad. I thought I could whip 'em."

"People ain't horses, boy. You can't always make them do what you want. In fact, you shouldn't try," he said softly to the boy. He looked at his own dogs. He and his son, and now his grandson, were all good with animals, but Jasper was the best of them all. The boy had learned to ride at age four, and there wasn't a horse standing that wouldn't take him now.

"Pa thinks I should be able to," Jasper said, his voice hard. "He says I need to learn to lead men, just like he does. I want to! Lord knows I want to! I want to make him right proud of me. I want to be able to do what he does. Only, I can't ken it. I don' know how."

The Reverend took a deep breath. Not only was this a sore point for his grandson, but it was the source of the rift between himself and his own son.

"You know I don't agree with yer Pa," he said, thinking hard about his next words. "He's right that a boy with your spirit can sway a crowd once you learn how. What you do with them horses is clear evidence of it." He made his voice soft now, trying both to soothe his grandson and make him see a point. "Leading men isn't about forcing them to bend to yer will. It's about showing them the right path. You can move a cow by pushing it, but it won't move far. Or you can lead a cow with a handful of grass and leading it to the path. Then it will follow you without a fuss. Both ways work, I suppose, but I reckon it's much easier to pull a cow with a handful of hay, than push the other end and stick your arm up an ass."

Jasper chuckled. The Reverend put his arm around the young lad and felt the boy relax under him.

"Time's a comin' when you have to choose, Jasper. Your Pa, he chose to force men to do his will. He leads them for the power of being the leader. He uses them for pride's sake. I lead men, too, but I hope it's for a different reason. Yer Meemaw and I, we want to be a blessin' to the folks around us.

"It's yer time, now, boy. It's yer time to choose. I pray you choose it well." The Reverend looked at the boy. The few waves in the pond sent ripples of light across his face. He knew, as he always knew, that the boy was torn inside. Jasper had a natural ability to lead, but he also had the desire to control those he led, just as he controlled the horses. And he was prideful.

His son was almost cruel in his relations with others, caring only about how they might add to his own power and prestige. Jasper was in danger of following that lonely, hurtful path.

The Reverend indeed prayed that the boy would choose well. Such a gift could be a great blessing or an unbearable curse. If he was right about the boy, Jasper could bring either great joy or enormous pain and sorrow if he chose poorly.

_**April 22, 1966**_

I looked out at the still pool. The sun's light, filtering through the trees, reflected off the few waves that rippled the surface. The river to my right rushed on its way through the hills and rocks around me. The scent of the cattails called a memory to the surface that I couldn't see clearly. The memory was one from my human years, one I'd kept and treasured for some reason, but it was so very dim.

A pond, surrounded by cattails and rocks, my grandfather, fish, and perhaps animals of some kind all swirled unfocused in my mind. He had placed his arm around my shoulder, and I had felt at home. There was something important there, but I could no better grasp it than I could leap to the moon.

I never knew why memories tugged at me. There was some reason, I was sure, and sometimes the link was easy to make. This foggy one gave me a sense of peace, but there was a strange urgency to it today.

The sun reflected off the water and my skin again, and the hidden space filled with light. I paused a bit longer to enjoy it. The others would not be returning from school yet, and I was done eating, so there was time to enjoy the play of the light and the strange restfulness that the place brought me. Besides, tonight would be stressful enough. We were going into town to see a movie, and I would be on guard against myself all night.

I probed the memory, trying to find why it felt urgent now, but no reason came to me. All that I knew was the pool of water, the peace I felt here, and the feel of my grandfather's arm across my shoulders.

A small breeze disturbed the mirror surface of the pond. I watched the pattern of the waves on the water and took in the tangy smell of pine.

And turned to hot ice.

Barely detectable, but definitely there, another scent tainted the forest's smell. I sucked in air, pulling it over my tongue to be sure. The scent was both known and unknown to me. Two scents, then.

Other memories crashed in on me. Screams, heady incense, death. They flooded in, eradicating the peace.

Hernandez's scent, weak but recognizable, tainted the clean wind. Maria's right hand man had been in these woods.

I crouched, instinct taking over my thoughts, and began to search for their path. It took a while, but I finally realized they used my favorite trick of taking to the trees, and the moment I was up in the canopy of the forest, his scent and that of another assailed me. They had run through the trees more than a half hour before I came here. Had I not paused by the pool, I would have never detected it.

I had to silence my growls as I quickly tracked both ends of the path. From their scents I could tell they had come from the east, from the direction of Calgary, but their path was too twisted to be sure they had been in the city.

Fear and hatred engulfed me. Enemies were here. Enemies had been in the city.

Calgary – where Alice was.

Enemies were heading deeper into the woods. The ice melted in the heat of venom. They had come from town and were heading deeper into the woods.

They were heading for home.

Alice was on her way home.

I gripped a trunk and splintered the tree. I had to get control of myself.

Carefully now, I made my decision and traced the path, in the hope she could see me.

I paused in the middle of their trail. I had only spent two minutes tracking them, but that was enough time to kill a vampire. To us, that was an eternity. I had to make a choice.

My growl echoed off the trees around me. I had no idea of where my mate was. I had no idea if they had found her. All I knew was that Maria was about to bring her curse down upon the Cullens.

Everything within me pulled me to the city, to find my mate, but I couldn't do it. I could not go. The scents didn't lead to the city; they led towards home. Emmett, Rosalie and Edward were with her. I had to trust them to keep her safe, but I'd never felt so helpless in that trust.

I closed my eyes against the panic and turned towards the house. I'd left Esme there. Carlisle, if he were still alive, wouldn't have returned home from the hospital yet.

They were heading towards Esme, and she was alone.

The small part of my rational mind knew that I needed stealth more than strength. There were two of them; two soldiers at least. Hernandez would not be expecting me to find them. Had they wanted me to find them, they would have left a clearer trail. This path was too serpentine, too hidden. This was a surprise attack, but the element of surprise was now on my side.

I ran with reckless speed, using only the most rudimentary tactics to hide my passing and suppressing my urge to find Alice with each stride. I had to follow our plan. We had prepared for this. Alice knew what to do. She would have seen this. Four vampires would have been too much for Maria to attack openly. Besides, Edward and Alice were a deadly pair.

I had to trust that.

My only focus now was to reach Esme. She was alone. She had no gifts to warn her. Carlisle was not there.

The fury I had suppressed boiled over as I neared our home. The scents were powerful here.

I could not imagine losing Esme. I could not let that happen to my family.

Yet even through the fury, I knew that all our planning might not stop the unimaginable.

Memories of how easily and quickly Maria and I had been able to isolate and destroy covens flooded back to me. The cries of mates as they saw their lovers being tortured and torn apart echoed through my mind, drowning out all else.

I ran faster, ignoring all the need for stealth.

I had to save her. I had to save them all.

o~O~o

I slowed only when I was in the familiar woods around our home. The stone and log cabin structure was not yet in sight, but I could see the power and phone lines in the distance. I darted from tree to tree now, tasting the air for the scents of my enemies.

Two. Maria sent two. That was not an attack group unless she was certain Esme was alone.

I could not think of that now.

I came to the edge of the forest and slid on my belly through the thick undergrowth. I could not smell them here. They must have gone around to the back of the home where there were fewer windows.

The shrill ring of the phone cut through the forest noise. I hoped it was Alice giving a warning. I hoped it was Carlisle saying he was late.

I felt a pang of fear that must have come from Esme, and relief washed over me. She had been warned. That meant Alice was alive.

I felt the other two now. They did not have the animosity that foretold of an attack, but they were aggressive. They were also smug.

That could mean any number of things, but I hoped it meant that they were only prepared to take her. Kidnapping was the fastest way to gain an advantage. Maria used it often.

Esme's fear began to move, to leave the place, and I knew she had entered the rough tunnel we had dug that connected with the ancient underground stream. It was a treacherous escape route at best, but it would hide her and gave me time to formulate my plan.

I shifted position, rolling in the thick mud and heading towards the intruders. A slight shift in the plants about a hundred yards away gave the trespassers away.

I watched in disgust as Hernandez exited the forest and hid behind the ancient woodpile. He looked and felt just the same to me. The familiar, oily feeling that he bore filled the space between us. Then, another vampire, a Mexican by the look of him, joined him. In a flash, they were at both the front and back door. Another slight rustling across the meadow gave me the location of a third vampire. Then I understood.

They had indeed come for Esme. Two to capture, and one to catch if she somehow got out. They had been watching us. They had watched us long enough to know our routines, and we hadn't even known.

They knew of Esme's solitude. They had planned to use her against us all.

The two vampires rushed into the home, and I heard the old wood of the house creak as they searched for her.

I felt their frustration rise.

This was indeed a tactic I knew well. I knew the pain and terror they were planning to inflict on the gentle woman. I blocked the memories and turned my attention back to the home.

If Esme had done it right, it would be almost impossible for them to find her exit. We had planned it well, and the floor panel was so covered with the scent of Carlisle's herbal concoctions that they would not ever be able to tell that she'd last been there. If they didn't destroy the home, and they didn't find the hidden panel, Esme would stay safe, and we could use it again.

I was grateful she hadn't dropped the steel window panels. As it was, they would believe that they had simply missed her. We would keep our secrets intact.

We had the advantage.

The two vampires exited through the front door, and I settled deeper into the mud. They motioned to the third to join them. They didn't speak, but rather used the rapid hand signs we'd used when I was a soldier. They were worried that Maria would be angry with them. I smiled, knowing she would indeed. They had played their first hand and been trumped, and now they would have to show themselves or destroy the evidence of their failed try.

They rapidly argued with motions and unspoken words. They were unsure of what to do now. One wanted the home destroyed, but the other two were reluctant. Then, without destroying the house, they ran off into the dark woods.

I snaked my way back to a safe distance, and took to the trees to reach the opening of the decrepit well. I ran quickly, but carefully. We had the advantage, and I could not lose it.

The well opening was so overgrown that it was invisible even to our kind. The only hint of what might be there was the scent of mineral laden water. When I reached it, the plants and dirt was undisturbed. I watched and felt for enemies before dropping down the small hole covered by undergrowth. I was immediately engulfed in blackness.

"It's me," I said into the black and gray world of the waterway.

I heard Esme's quiet release of breath and felt her complete relief. She was suddenly by me, and I instinctually put my arms around her. She fiercely gripped me back.

"Ugh," she whispered pulling back and wiping off the mud from her hands. "Alice is going to be mad at us both."

I couldn't stop my chuckle. Only Esme would worry about dirt and my mate's reaction at a time like this.

"I believe she already is," I breathed back. I saw her smile at that.

She shuffled away from me, wiping the mud from her dress. She looked up at the tiny dot of sky above us.

I held up my hand and carefully checked the area. With a nod, I walked over and held the rope that we'd hung from the roof of the stone cave. I went out first, still cautious. None of my senses could detect anyone. She deftly climbed up behind me and then leapt out of the hole. I grabbed her hand and led her into the deep cover of the forest.

"Where?" she asked.

"Frank's station," I said. "It's the closest pay phone. Fill your mind with it." It was a message to Alice.

xX~oOo~Xx

"I say we just go after the bastards," Emmett said. "There are only three of them." Of course he would say that.

Edward rolled his eyes in agreement.

"Maria has other plans. She never makes any move until she is sure she is ready. Then, she acts without warning," I stated. "She is ready to take us on, and that means a direct fight will end in disaster." My arms constricted around Alice who was tucked tightly into my side. The relief I'd felt when they drove up still washed through me, and my arms would not release her.

We all heard the purr of Carlisle's engine, and Esme jumped a little. Edward stood next to her, his arm around her shoulders. I could feel her longing.

As I'd instructed, Carlisle stopped and got gas, just as Emmett had done. This was our normal spot to fill up, and it would look perfectly natural to meet up here. I could feel Carlisle's anxiety shooting from his relaxed form.

"Show yourself," Edward whispered, and Esme walked forward to wave. Carlisle's relief was tangible.

"Emmett," I said. He smiled at me, threw his shoulders back, and waved commandingly for Carlisle to join us.

"Ham," muttered Rosalie.

"Just doing some impromptu here, Rosie. It's not often I get to play the head honcho," he was grinning from ear to ear.

Carlisle's arms pulled Esme to him in a crushing hug as he joined us. For a moment, he stood, holding his mate and breathing the scent of her hair in. His eyes were closed, and I could feel the fear and rage pulse from him.

He'd come far too close to losing her.

After a moment, Carlisle looked to Edward who shook his head. Then, he held out his hand for me to shake. I took it, feeling the almost electric flow of gratitude, and suddenly, I was pulled into his embrace. His voice trembled and cracked as he whispered his thank you to me.

He released me and pulled Esme next to him. "Are you sure?" he asked Edward.

"Neither of us senses them around us, but we aren't taking any chances."

"No, we can't take any chances now," Carlisle said. He looked to each of us. "What do we know and how do we proceed?"

"We have to play as if we know nothing," I began. "We have to get them close enough to let Edward hear them and Alice see their moves. That means that she will know how gifted the cov – family is, but she won't know exactly _what_ they can do. It is the only way to get our biggest advantage."

"I think that they are biding their time again," said Alice with a far off look. "They know they lost a great opportunity." She stiffened and Edward looked at her intently.

"That doesn't help much," he said.

"At least I don't see a threat," she retorted. Emmett huffed and rolled his eyes. "She doesn't seem to want a battle. I see them in many different visions, but none of them are violent."

"None of them are friendly, either," Edward warned. "Maria definitely wants to meet us, and none of those are happy events."

"But none of them end in flames yet," Alice said.

"Well, that's a happy thought," Rosalie quipped. "I'm with Emmett. Let's just find out where they are and end this."

Alice sighed, and I answered for her. "It isn't always that easy, especially with a commander like Maria."

"He's right," Edward said. "Alice had plenty of visions, but none are specific enough to act on. Maria hasn't made any real decisions yet. So, for now, we act our parts, _Esme_."

Rosalie rolled her eyes but didn't argue.

"I must agree. There is no reason to start a battle that may be deadly for us if there is no real threat. We don't know enough yet," Carlisle said with finality. He pulled his mate closer to him. "For now, we act like a normal coven. A normal coven led by a powerful vampire who is about to discover that his home has been invaded."

"Are you ready for the role of your life?" Esme asked the grinning Emmett.

"I was born ready for this," he said with enthusiasm. Then he stood there.

"Son, we are waiting for you," Carlisle reminded him gently.

"Right!" Emmett said, and then he cleared his perfectly clear throat. "Let's head home!" He grabbed Rosalie's hand and strode out of the woods. Edward and I exchanged looks, and Alice mumbled something about the future twisting in a bad way.

There was no need to act out the family's reaction to finding two unfamiliar scents in the home. Instinct was all we needed for that. Emmett was appropriately angry when he exited the car, and his protectiveness and aggression made him look every inch the imposing leader we wanted him to appear.

They had been watching us from a distance, and I knew that by sight, Carlisle would not appear to be the leader. Edward or Emmett would be the logical choice, and Emmett's imposing presence would clearly mark him as the coven master.

And so that is how we played this.

Emmett stayed close to the home and sent Edward and I out to search for the intruders.

"We did a complete sweep, and found nothing more than a few trails," Edward announced.

"I feel so vulnerable," Rosalie mumbled. She looked miserable. Of all of us, Rosalie could least tolerate being in a vulnerable position. Emmett pulled her into his arms.

Carlisle and Esme came down the stairs. She was still tucked under his arm. "I don't think they took anything at all," he said. He and Esme sat on the sofa together. He was taking no chances with his beloved mate. I couldn't blame him.

We moved closer. Alice looked to Edward and he shook his head.

"I think we can speak freely," she whispered.

"Have you seen anything?" Esme asked.

"A thousand possibilities and a thousand dead ends. You were right, Jasper, she is very good at _not_ making a decision." Frustration colored her words.

"But no attacks?" Emmett asked.

Alice shook her head. "None that I can see. They will be friendly at first. I don't think it lasts long, though."

"Are you sure they are coming? What if they just decide this isn't worth it?" Rosalie almost sounded hopeful.

"Maria came a long way and has been looking a long time. There is no way she will give up now," I reminded her. I felt a stab of guilt over those words. The family was in danger because of me, and there was no avoiding it now.

"We protect our own," Edward said. I looked at him. He was excited about a possible fight. He was also very young. I sent him a few choice memories of battles I'd nearly lost. He grimaced but kept his stance.

"So we have no idea what her next move will be? None at all?" Emmett asked.

"I wish I had a better answer for you. I wish I knew what her next step might be, but her mind is too twisted," I explained. "Even after eighty years, I never knew quite what to expect – except for madness."

"If she is willing to attack a coven our size, then madness is the best answer," agreed Edward.

"It's hard to fight madness," said Carlisle.

"It isn't madness to take a member of a coven to use against them. It's bold but not crazy. If she is willing to kidnap, then we should expect something just as audacious," said Rosalie.

"We are a strong coven, by anyone's standard," Carlisle reminded us all. "Even without our gifts, we would rarely be attacked openly. The fact that they came and did not destroy the home or take anything tells me that she feels she has the upper hand. We need to know what that hand holds."

Emmett looked at us from the window where he stood. "If it was poker, and you'd lost your strongest hand, the only option left would be to bluff." I looked at him, and marveled at his tactical understanding.

"Unless she has an army hidden nearby, she cannot bluff that her hand is strong," nodded Carlisle.

"Then she plays it like her hand is weaker than it is," I said. She has something she believes will work, or Alice would have seen them leave. Maria was many things, but courageous was not one of them. She would not stay unless she had a winning move in mind, or was simply that desperate. "She's going to throw down her hand and keep the ace she is hiding for another round."

"What does that mean?" asked Esme, who had a tight grip on her mate's hand.

"It means she is coming here," said Alice.

X||xXx||X

"I thought hiding from the _sun_ was bad. Hiding from _her_ is making me crazy," said Rosalie. She slammed the book shut and strode back up to her room, leaving me alone and relieved. Rosalie's emotions were abrasive.

It had only been two days, but the tension in the house was tangible. We couldn't leave until we knew more, no one could go anywhere alone, and Alice had only seen that they would indeed come to us here. We had no idea of when.

I felt my mate before I saw her. She was far more tense than the rest of us. Just as before, she had taken on the responsibility of getting our family safely through this even though we'd all told her not to.

Without a word, she put her arms around my waist and melted against me.

"I wish we could be alone," she said, her voice strained.

"Me too, Beloved. This is as alone as we can get for now."

Esme was ironing in the washroom, and Carlisle was taking advantage of the time off to do some studying. Edward and Emmett we checking the perimeter of our land, just as the leader should.

"What is she like?" Alice asked me suddenly. It took me by surprise.

"You've seen her," I reminded her. In all our years together, we'd never truly talked of Maria. I wasn't ready to start.

"What does she _feel_ like?" Alice corrected. "What does she feel like to you?"

I thought about it. I had tried for so long to forget Maria that it was difficult to remember. "Like something twisted. Something that appears healthy, but is dead and rotting inside."

"You hate her." It was a statement, a rather happy one.

"Hate isn't strong enough. I don't know of a word that is strong enough. I abhor her, but more than that, the very idea that she is here infuriates and disgusts me. I want to see her suffer like she made me suffer."

Alice looked up at me and pecked me on the nose. "Good."

"Good? _Good! _We are on the verge of being annihilated by an insane vampire and her evil horde, and all you can say is '_good'_?"

"You never mentioned the evil horde," Alice said with a grin. "Evil hordes change things a bit."

"You have nothing to worry about," I said, and I nuzzled her ear. I wished for the thousandth time that we could have a few minutes to ourselves.

"You just told me to worry about the Evil Horde," she giggled. I gave her cheek a raspberry, and she squealed. Her mood was better.

"Worry about the Horde but don't worry about Maria's effect on me. If there was a way for me to erase her from my past, I would. I would go back and change _everything_ I was before meeting you."

A smile spread across Alice's face but then faded just as quickly. "I never wanted to ask… never really wanted to know… but it is important to me now… I know it shouldn't be…"

I put my hand over her mouth. I could feel her uncertainty. "Ask me anything you want. You won't hurt me."

She looked at me, her eyes searching my face. "Did you love her once?" she asked.

Deep within her, I could feel the little girl's uncertainty. There was no fear, just hesitancy.

"I have been three people in my long life. I don't remember much of the first one, I don't know if he ever loved a woman, but I think he did. The second one thought he loved but had no way to understand that it was selfish need and desire he felt. When you are nothing but a hungry monster, you feel nothing more than hungry, greedy emotion. Only the third man loves. Without a doubt, the third man loves." I never took my eyes from hers.

"It was eighty years, Jasper," she said, blinking.

"It was," I said. "I was nothing more than empty desire for eighty long years. Every day, the only pleasure I could hope for was nothing but a lie. The funny thing is, I honestly _thought_ it was love at the time. I didn't even know it wasn't until I walked into a small diner to get out of the rain."

"And I scared you."

"You amazed me. I just didn't know it," I whispered as I kissed her long and hard.

"I am the only one," she whispered as we pulled apart.

"In all the universe, Alice Whitlock, you will forever be the only one."

"You are very sexy when we are under the threat of war," she said, wriggling against me.

"We need to make more enemies." She giggled. I was only half way joking.

"You two are shameless," said Rosalie as she came back into the room. "But I know what you mean, Alice. My baby looks _good_ when he is all fierce and protective. You know, maybe we should get uniforms like the military. Or maybe even those super hero outfits. Emmett would look good in one of those."

She wasn't kidding. Neither of us said anything.

Thankfully, I felt her mate and Edward return. They were coming fast, faster than any other time.

"Carlisle, Esme!" Alice called quietly. Her voice was strained.

"You smelled something," Carlisle said as they entered. Emmett nodded at Edward and went directly to his mate.

"From the west," Edward said through stiff lips. "Only one. Male. He was sent to look and report."

"How close?"

"Far enough that even he would need binoculars, but high enough that on a clear day like this, he could watch us." Edward seethed. "We were just close enough to get a few thoughts. He knows nothing more than to watch and report."

"She must have been watching us from that distance for a while now," I said. "She wouldn't have sent those soldiers after Esme if she wasn't sure of herself." And then I knew. "They weren't just after Esme. They were testing the waters. Maria sent them as a test to see what we could do. It was the perfect way to determine our strength, a no lose scenario for-"

Edward's deep growl cut me off, and Alice slumped a little against me. It was just for a moment, but that was all it took.

"What?" cried Rosalie in alarm.

"They're coming," Edward and I answered at the same time.

"From everywhere," whispered Alice. Then she looked to the front door.

"Now." Carlisle only whispered the word, but it was a command like no other. It shook us out of our stupor, and we quickly took our assigned places. Emmett and Rosalie in the front, I and Alice behind them to the right, and the last three together at the left. If Carlisle, Esme and Edward were together, she would not know which one was gifted. Or so we hoped.

We stood in motionless silence. Within a moment, the sound of rushing wind and then careless feet could be heard around the house. Alice was right; they were everywhere.

Then, every hateful thing of my past slammed into me with such force that I gasped, reeling from the invisible blow.

I wasn't expecting the assault. I'd forgotten the chaos of emotions that was Maria. I'd forgotten the heady rush she gave me. I was unprepared for the havoc that meeting my creator again wrought within me.

I felt Alice reach around me, but my muscles contracted on their own, as if avoiding the blows. I barely remained standing.

Emmett looked at me with concern and I could feel the other's stares. I took a breath and braced myself against those horrible, familiar feelings.

Then, the sound of wind stopped, and three crisp knocks sounded at the door.

It was a small, brisk knock, almost demanding. I clamped down on my own emotional havoc and focused on keeping the room around me calm.

Emmett looked at me. I nodded to him and pulled Alice behind me a little.

He took a breath and strode towards the door, Rosalie right behind him. Alice pressed further into my side. I knew that this was as hard for her as for me. The last person on earth she wanted to meet was Maria.

"Three at the back," hissed Edward before Emmett could turn the knob. The small nod was all that told us he had heard.

With a decisive twist of his wrist, Maria was before us.

She was just as I'd left her, except for a change of clothes and two bite marks on her neck, she was exactly the same. I fought two emotions. The first was hatred, which I was prepared for. The second shocked me, sickened me to the point of retching. It was desire. My body still remembered what my mind had forgotten.

Desire for her body. Desire for human blood. The monster within roared in recognition.

I hated her even more for it.

My arm constricted protectively around Alice as Maria looked for us, her smile sickeningly sweet as she surveyed the room.

White-hot hatred roared within me when her eyes found mine.

"Ah, Jasper, at last!" she said with mock relief. She tried to enter the room, but Emmett blocked her. She looked at him as if shocked.

"I'm afraid we haven't met," he said, unmoved by her display. "I'm Carlisle Cullen, and this is my mate, Esme, and my coven. I take it you are the one who sent raiders to invade my home." His voice was cold and precise, just as an enraged leader's should be.

I had to admit, he played it well. And he was having fun. His mood helped me get a better grip on my emotional state.

"I am Maria. Just Maria. I have forgotten any other names, and they are not important, anyway," she said almost dismissively. "I am Jasper's creator and comrade in arms, and I simply wanted to come and see my old lover."

The flame of hatred burned even hotter as she said the last word. I felt Alice suppress a growl.

Emmett leaned over so that Maria and I were able to look at each other. She beamed at me, and I nodded stiffly. Then her eyes dropped to Alice who was tucked into my side. I fought the urge to jump in front of my mate.

Emmett once again moved in between us, blocking her way.

"There," he said. "You've seen him. He's in good shape. Now you can go."

"I am not here to harm you, Carlisle Cullen. I simply want to visit my old friend," she said with a charming smile.

"It's considered rude to start a friendly visit by sending an attack force," Emmett said dryly.

Maria looked stunned. "Did my body guards harm your home? Did they take anything? They were under orders to determine if this was your home, but that was all. If they so much as left a scratch on anything, I will see that they burn."

"They entered my home. They touched nothing, but that doesn't make a difference. You sent men to our home and they _entered_ it," Emmett said with a menacing glare.

"I did not mean any harm, I assure you. If I did, we would not be standing here talking. I would have come behind my soldiers to survey the destruction. I am here as a friend, I assure you."

Her eyes began to survey the room, and I could tell by the look on her face that she was feeling out the strength of the vampires within it.

Edward nodded infinitesimally.

"There are three others behind the house," Carlisle said to Emmett. "The other two are by the road. They are waiting for a signal, I believe."

Maria's excitement was palpable. What should have worried her, warned her that she was in a weak position, only made her more determined.

"I am no fool, Carlisle Cullen. I have lived and ruled a very long time because I do not take chances. My men are here to ensure my safety, and that is all." Her eyes darted around the room again, coming to rest as last on Alice. The moment she fixed her gaze on my Beloved, the searing pain of venom coursed through me. That was what she had become, the source of all my pain. Maria's mood changed to one of possessive hunger. Mine changed to murderous rage.

That was enough for me to act, but a warning of fear stabbed me from Edward and Alice.

"No," said Carlisle. It was Edward's warning, sent through the complex and silent way they had learned to communicate over the years.

Maria's gaze shifted to the three of them standing there. She could sense the gift, but I knew she could not yet tell which one had it.

I buried my need for revenge, my need to destroy the source of my pain.

"You have seen me, Maria. As Carlisle said, I am content in this coven. I have a mate, and am finally happy." I had to fight to get the words out. "Now, you can go. I will not leave this place."

"I have come a long way to see you, my Jasper, and I don't intend to let the months of searching go to waste. You were my family, my only family, for eighty years. Isn't that worth something, Jasper?" She turned her bright red eyes on me.

It took all I had not to leap for her throat. "I'm afraid your idea of family isn't the same as mine any longer," I responded. I felt desperation and determination come from her. In Maria, that was a deadly mix. Alice tensed at my side.

"Jasper, please," Maria whispered. Her eyes were anything but pleading. Instead, they held a warning. She was insane enough to believe that she could still get whatever she wanted, even faced with a coven such as ours. Insanity had a nasty habit of leading to risky decisions.

"Come back tomorrow," Emmett ordered. "Come back tomorrow without your soldiers, and we can talk then. If Jasper wants to talk to you, we will let him. If not, you will need to leave."

Maria looked at him, weighing his words and measuring his strength.

"That is the only option I am willing to give you, Maria. If you think you can fight us, you are mistaken. Jasper told us of your gift, and I'm sure you know exactly how strong my coven is. If you try anything, we will know. I will not tolerate your games," Emmett said. His demeanor and words were perfect. Once again, the complex poker player astounded me.

"Jasper?" Maria didn't respond to Emmett, but rather asked me. It was an affront, but Emmett wisely let it go.

"Tomorrow," I said with a nod. "And Maria," I added, "for your sake, take Carlisle's warning seriously. Even though you deserve it, I don't want to be the one to burn you."

She cocked an eyebrow at me, and gave me a wide smile. Then, she was gone.

No one moved for several minutes. Finally, Edward took a deep breath and nodded.

"I don't feel anything, either," I said. "No one move positions yet, though."

"They will try to watch us," Edward told the room. "That much is certain. She will try to get us to let our guard down so that she can find out exactly what our gifts are. She is very curious about Carlisle's."

"She believed it then?" asked Rosalie.

"She was confused by what she sensed," I said, "but she definitely believed at least part of it."

"Her mind is a whirling mess of explicit thoughts and changing ideas," said Edward with a look of disgust. "The woman has a sex drive worse than yours." He poked his finger at Emmett. "She was almost salivating at the idea of what our coven's potential is. By the way, you scared her," he added as he looked at the huge vampire.

"Really?" He chuckled. "That's cool, man!"

"It was Oscar worthy," said Esme with a smile. "All you need is Atlanta burning in the background or the Ten Commandments lying around somewhere, and you'd be a shoe in."

"I was as good as Heston, huh? That sounds about right. Me and God could be like that!" He crossed his fingers to show us.

"You're better than Heston, baby. You're even better than Gable," Rosalie beamed.

Emmett grabbed Rosalie around the waist and pulled her over backwards. "Frankly my dear Rosalie, I don't give a damn." With that, he kissed her hard on the mouth while Rosalie giggled.

"Jasper, what do you recommend?" Carlisle asked, bringing us all back from Emmett's spectacle.

"I don't think we can deter her, at least, not without a fight of some kind. The only way to know what she is planning is to keep her close."

"She won't start anything any time soon," Alice said, her voice tight.

"She wants you two too much," Edward said, looking at us. "And she is _very _interested in Carlisle. She was surprised by him." He gave us all a wry smile.

"Reading minds is a blessing and a curse," Carlisle sighed.

"A part of her twisted mind - a small part - really does want to make sure Jasper is all right. It seems she thinks of you as her child, Jasper; which is rather disgusting if you think about your past relationship with her." Edward's face twisted into a grimace.

"What about me? Doesn't she want a powerful vampire like me?" Emmett asked.

"Well, yes, but not for your fighting skills or any gift you might have," Edward sniggered. "But she definitely _wants_ you."

Emmett wiggled his eyebrows. "That _is_ my gift, my brother," he said in a sultry voice. Rosalie burst out laughing.

"What about you?" I asked Edward. "Does she suspect anything about you?"

His emotions suddenly turned hesitant. "No. Our ruse worked for now. She knows about Alice already, thanks to the vampires in New York, and she desperately wants the two of you under her control. She felt my gift, but attributed it to Carlisle. She is very curious as to what it is."

"What does she think of Rosalie, Esme and you?" Emmett asked him.

"Not much. She is only interested in acquiring vampires who can aid her."

"Liar," I said. I couldn't stop the small smile that tugged at my lips. I knew exactly what Maria would think of him.

"She has a very hard mind to follow," he said firmly. Then Alice giggled and he sighed.

"It will be better if you just tell us," she reprimanded him.

He cleared his throat and looked at the ceiling. "She enjoys the, um, company of a wide variety of vampires, both male and female."

Esme gasped and Rosalie laughed. Alice giggled harder.

"What does that have to do with you?" Emmett asked, his eyes narrowing as he began to realize what was making Edward so uncomfortable.

"She was inordinately attracted to me, that's all."

"_Why?"_ pushed Emmett with an evil grin. He looked like a shark that has smelled blood in the water.

"She thinks I look. . ." began Edward, obviously trying to find the proper way of saying it. Rosalie giggled again, and he glared at her. "Young."

She burst out in guffaws. "Don't you mean, _effeminate?"_

Edward roared at her.

"Not in the _house!"_ Esme yelled.


	4. Chapter 4

I know it's been forever since I've been on fanfiction either as a writer or a reader, and I'm terribly sorry. It's been a rough half year, but my life and writing are back on track now. For an explaination about why I went AWOL, please go to my website: http: / / kaylagriffith . net / fanfic-news-and-notes /

You will need to take out the spaces for the url to work.

Anyway, I am thrilled to be back. Most of the story is written in one form or another, and I hope to continue posting twice a month until it is complete.

My heartfelt thanks to my beta, SmittenbyTwilight. Without her, this would not be posted.

Everything belongs to Stephenie Meyer. I wish she would come back to play.

* * *

**February, 1861**

The Reverend silently opened the library door, curious about the thin light that flickered through the crack underneath. Although he couldn't think of anyone else who might come here so late, he was still surprised to see Jasper's thin form hunched over a book. The boy, now almost grown to manhood, hadn't been inside the room for almost a year. He sat, broad shoulders hunched over and staring at the page, seeing nothing. It was an ancient Psalter, one Jasper read often in his youth. The Reverend's heart sank at the sight.

There was only one reason the boy would come here.

Jasper was so lost in thought that he hadn't heard the heavy footfalls on thin carpet, so the Reverend knocked at his own door. "Didn't mean to disturb you, Jasper," he said when the boy jumped. He looked up at the tall lad, taller than most men, but still too young to grow a proper beard or mustache.

Jasper's face reddened and his brows crossed in anger. Then just as quickly, he looked like a child again. The Reverend waited to see which would win, the man or boy.

"You don't need to do this," the Reverend finally said after several moments. "You ain't a man yet, and it isn't expected of you."

Jasper's eyes bored into his grandfather. "How did…? It doesn't matter; it is expected of me. This is my chance. Pa says I can come back a hero. He says this is my chance to finally prove myself."

"Or you can come back broken and wounded. Or not at all." The Reverend said it quietly. Confrontation with a hotheaded young man wouldn't get him far. He fought the urge to grab Jasper and shake him, to force him to open his eyes and see war and the world for what they were. But instead, he sighed and resigned himself. He couldn't be reasoned with at that age, either, and with his father's talons in him, Jasper wouldn't back down from this.

"Are you fighting for the South or fighting for your father's respect?" he asked, when Jasper still hadn't spoken.

"The South needs her young men," Jasper snapped back. "We must defend what's ours." The words were clipped in righteous anger.

The old man held up his hands. "I won't stop you, Jasper. You have to do what you think is right, just make sure it really is the right thing to do. Make sure you kill for the right reasons so that you have no regrets afterward."

Jasper shifted his stance and stared at the floor. Reverend Whitlock knew why Jasper was leaving, and it had very little to do with the honor of the South. Jasper, like his father, craved power and position, and with his gifts, he would attain them. If he wasn't dead.

"Does your mother know?"

Jasper's breathing hitched and his chest heaved as he tried to respond. Finally, he shook his head.

"It'll kill her, boy." The Reverend sat heavily on the desk. His daughter-in-law protected Jasper as best she could. He grimaced as he remembered the bruises on her face and the haunted look in her eyes. Although she denied it, the Reverend knew the truth. Each bruise was one less Jasper endured, and each one made him hate his own son that much more.

"You'll help her, won't you PawPaw?" Jasper was suddenly the boy again.

Reverend Whitlock nodded, a lump blocking his voice for a moment. He hated the idea of this man-child in war. He hated what it would do to the boy in him.

"When?" he asked, his voice like gravel.

Jasper shrugged and looked up. "The army officials will be here in the mornin'. The courier said they take you straight away once you sign your name. We'll be heading out by the afternoon."

"Not much time, is there?"

Jasper shook his head and his shoulders slumped. "I'm ready for this," he said to the room around him. "Thanks for takin' care of Ma for me." Jasper looked once into his grandfather's eyes and bolted for the door.

Just in time, the older man grabbed his arm and whirled the boy into a stiff hug. Jasper gripped him tightly for just a moment. The Reverend handed him a new leather pouch that he'd grabbed from his desk.

"No matter what is done to you, or what happens, never give up on what is right and just. Never give up hope," the Reverend whispered. Neither man looked at the other as Jasper pulled away and rushed out the door.

Reverend Whitlock collapsed into the desk chair, looked at the Psalter, and began to sob.

o~O~o

The bespectacled, balding officer adjusted his lenses and looked again at Jasper. Jasper stood taller, and pushed his shoulders out and back, hoping his height would make up for his lack of a beard.

"What year did you say again?" the man asked.

"Eighteen-fifty-three, sir. In January."

"And you don't have a Bible or baptismal certificate for proof?"

Jasper looked at the man and smiled, willing him to believe the lie. "I was born in a sod house, sir. My Ma and Pa ain't even sure of the day. I was several months old by the time they hitched the wagon to town for my baptism."

"Will you stop questioning the man, Willard?" said the officer beside the balding one. "Look at him. He's a strapping youth, but old enough to fight for his country." He laughed and waved at Jasper's dusty form. This one, a captain, was thoroughly impressed with the cavalry test, and the fact that Jasper brought his own horse.

The one named Willard pushed his glasses up on his nose and bent over the papers. Jasper watched in relief as the man signed his name and handed them back. "Report over there to your sergeant, soldier."

Jasper beamed. "Thank you, sir," he said, and then grabbed his pack and headed over to the group of similar young men by the wagons. He was one of the few who had a horse, and that almost guaranteed him a spot in the cavalry-that and his perfect performance on the horse earlier. He nodded at the others waiting there. They were all older, their chins covered with thin beards, but none had done as well as he.

Jasper noticed the small crowd surrounding the army contingent. Many of the viewers were family members, many others were just onlookers, eager for a free show on the unseasonably warm day. But it was the young women that drew his attention away from the men around him. Several of the ladies were looking at him intently. He smiled at them, suddenly aware of their attention, and three waved back shyly. His face heated.

"Impressive ride," said one of the older recruits beside him, and another man nodded.

"Thank you," Jasper said. Several others eyed him. He'd impressed them.

"All right, men! That's enough fun. Load up your gear and separate into groups. Infantry to my left, cavalry to my right. Riders, in the back!" The sergeant was already red in the face, and yelling only made it worse.

Jasper began to shuffle over to the makeshift corral when something hit his shoulder. "You get those others into two lines. You ride behind the wagons in tight formation. You got that?"

Jasper's eyes widened and he felt a thrill flow through him. "Yes, sir!" He was only sixteen and already in charge of a group of men.

He gathered the men and got them in order, easily showing the animals what to do when the men were too stupid to understand. Once mounted, he surveyed the scene before him, hoping in vain that his father had come to watch. But he hadn't.

Jasper swallowed against the bitter taste in his mouth and the lump in his throat. Then his eyes caught those of another. Eyes filled with both pain and pride.

His mother and sister were in the crowd.

His grandparents flanked his mother, holding her between them. For just a moment, Jasper melted into the boy he'd been. His mother's red-rimmed eyes pleaded with him. He almost turned, almost gave in, but he had men to lead and a life to begin. The boy longed to go to her, but the man in him stood his ground.

He believed his father's words that if she had her way, he would stay a boy forever. After all, his mother always gave into his weakness. She'd allowed him the tears his father wouldn't tolerate. That weakness made his father ashamed of him. Jasper would prove to him once and for all that he could indeed be a strong man.

He looked his mother in the eye, nodded, and continued on without so much as a smile. He would not show weakness now.

He glanced back just once as they rounded the bend. His mother stood alone, her hand raised. He raised his in return, but he was too far away to tell if she saw it amid the dust and men surrounding him.

With a jolt, Jasper realized his mother deserved better than that, but it was too late now. She'd come when his father wouldn't. Like always, she did right by him, no matter what the cost might be. His stomach clenched with the thought of his father's wrath.

He twisted further in the saddle, but she was out of sight.

The broken look on her face burned itself into his mind, and the memory of her painful expression haunted him as he rode. He would never forget her sad, fearful, eyes. She'd looked terrified for him, and he didn't even stop to give her comfort. He swallowed hard against the sick feeling in the pit of his stomach and focused his eyes ahead. When he returned a hero, he swore he would make it up to her.

_**Jasper**_

_**April 26, 1966**_

I kept watching Esme. Since our first few months here, I'd always thought of her as our mother. She filled a unique role among vampires as that loving center of every good family. Her love quietly but securely bound us together. Now, however, she truly did remind me of my mother. I saw the same desperation in her eyes as they darted around the room and rested on each of us. Her anxiety rose as she looked at Carlisle again, and I immediately did what I could to ease it.

She knew we were a strong coven, but had no real idea of just how lethal our combined gifts made us, and she feared losing one of us. Even though Alice saw no battles, Esme couldn't bear her family being in danger.

I glanced up from the maps on the table and looked at Alice who was still lost in the future. She couldn't bear it, either. She'd pushed herself to the point of pain trying to see what Maria would do next, but all she knew was that Maria would come around noon.

Carlisle and Edward went through a stack of old newspapers and talked softly together while Esme listened to them and stared into the void. Rosalie and Emmett played Monopoly as they waited for their next show to come on. But they all waited for Alice.

But Maria wouldn't give Alice a chance, and I knew it. Her tactic was to have no tactic, to let the battle decide for her. Even though she knew it was a waste of time, Alice kept trying, not because she feared Maria, but because she loved her family.

I looked back at the map of the region. We needed to know where Maria hid. Edward said that Maria's only thought of her hiding place was of a plush and rather gaudy chair, and that could be anywhere, but she didn't like roughing it. She'd choose a comfortable lair.

"What about one of the outlying ranches?" I asked, looking at Edward.

"The memory is of a chair sitting in a completely dark room. It didn't seem like a home or even a cabin, but it could be anywhere really. We'll need to steer the conversation to get her to think about it," he added with a meaningful glance at me.

"We'll all do our best to help with that," Carlisle said. He pointed to a couple of newspaper articles. "Two mysterious disappearances and a fiery car accident. I can't be sure about them, but with Maria's men in the city, I'm certain none of them was an accident. The car wasn't damaged enough to have been burnt like it was."

"We can't allow them to hunt here, no matter how harmless Maria said her visit is," Emmett said.

"Agreed. That is a demand we need to make of her regardless of anything else." Carlisle looked to Emmett who nodded. It would be up to Emmett to force that issue.

Fear burst from Esme again, but she quickly suppressed it. Edward said she was reliving the horror of her infant son's death. We were her family, and she'd lived through losing her family once before.

_Is she remembering again?_

Edward nodded at me. I felt rage boil at the thought of what Maria was doing to Esme and Alice, to all of us. I shoved it down, refusing to let it cloud my judgment, or to let Edward know my thoughts, and sent out as much calm as I could. It was hard to keep my own feelings buried, but I did.

I saw Alice cock her eyebrow at Edward. She knew in that infuriating way she had, that I was barely able to contain my anger. Edward knew I was angry; he knew I hated Maria and wanted her dead. He didn't have an issue with it.

I refused to think about what Edward didn't know and filled my mind with the map.

"But if Alice doesn't see a battle, doesn't that mean this will end peacefully?" Rosalie asked from the sofa. She and Emmett were settling in to watch Star Trek. Once again, I cursed the almost magical hold television had over Emmett. If Maria attacked during prime time, Emmett was ash.

"It is the logical conclusion," Emmett said. He looked at Rosalie and lifted his eyebrow in perfect Spock-like seriousness. She shoved him.

"It means Maria isn't planning to fight. Right now, she simply wants to talk," Alice said, as she checked yet again. The future was still uncertain, but Maria was coming, that much was sure. My chest felt more hollow every time I remembered the way she swept into the room. She wanted me back. I wanted her dead.

"It depends on exactly what she wants and how much she is willing to risk to get it," Carlisle added.

Rosalie and Emmett both looked at Edward and snorted. Edward growled in return.

"Will she really come without her cronies?" Emmett asked me.

"No. They'll be nearby, but we may not be able to detect them. Maria knows how to hide her forces, and this time, she'll hide them well."

"She has two conflicting desires. The first is simply to see Jasper. She was pleased with how he looked on one level. She cared for him like a mother, and still does in many ways. The second desire is to get him, and Alice, back. She's also now interested in Carlisle's gift, but since he is a part of this coven, she may not be willing to fight for him." Edward ticked off the list on his long fingers. "Fighting isn't likely to be in her plans during this visit."

"Agreed," I said. "Of course, that doesn't matter much. She changes her plans to fit her newest desire."

"We could simply leave. Why not go somewhere else?" asked Esme plaintively.

Carlisle brushed the hair along her face with his finger in a motion so gentle and full of love that Edward looked away. "This threat is best met head on," he said, his voice as gentle as silk. "She will only search for us again. Esme, trust me, we are a powerful coven. More powerful than Maria realizes. Our best hope is to make sure she knows we will not let her threaten us and then send her away. Perhaps, we can even do so in peace."

"Do you really think she will leave us in peace?" Esme asked her husband. She tucked herself under his arm.

I turned away. The memory of my mother's face, blurred with time, flashed painfully through my mind.

"I believe she will, if we play this right," Carlisle whispered into Esme's hair.

"We need to be ready for anything if we want peace." I didn't look up as I said it. I didn't want peace.

x||X||x

Even though she knew it was pointless, Alice pushed herself to see a future that hadn't been decided, yet. The only things Alice knew for certain was that Maria would come in the late morning and that she had terrible manners. That part I already knew.

But Alice couldn't stop trying. This was her family, and they were in danger, and I knew that every crystal in her body pushed her to protect them. By sunrise, she sighed in frustration and slumped down against me as we sat together on the sofa.

"Enough," I whispered into her ear. She huffed and rolled her eyes at me then rubbed her temple. I scooped her up into my arms and carried her to our room. She crossed her arms and glared at me, but didn't protest. I smirked at her-stubborn little imp.

"This isn't helping," she said , through clenched teeth when I plopped her on the bed. "Surely you aren't planning a quickie with Maria on the prowl!" She crossed her legs, too.

"I wasn't, but now that you mention it..." She snorted and tightened her twisted arms and legs. "It will get your mind off Maria, and you need a break, whether you believe it or not." I tapped her nose and laughed when she stuck out her tongue. "Can't blame a guy for trying. Besides, you can't save us by seeing what Maria will do. She is too slippery and too good at what she does. She won't make a mistake like that. You don't see violence, do you?"

"No, but you never know. The woman is incredibly rude, and rude people are capable of anything."

"You're worried a battle hardened murderer might be too _rude_ for us? I'll change my battle plans and try to protect the family from poor etiquette, then."

"Very funny. You don't understand, Jasper. I need to protect them. This is my family, and I can't lose them. Don't you see how worried Esme is? This is tearing her apart." Desperation poured from Alice.

"You don't understand," I said gently and kissed her cheek. "The more you look, the less likely I believe the outcome will be. The one thing I know for certain is that she always did what no one expected. In a world made of rigid stone, that kind of flexibility gave her the upper hand."

I hopped down next to her, and she huffed and stared at the ceiling. "She still comin' at noon?" The bed wiggled as she nodded. "Then leave it at that."

"You don't ever leave a possible threat unmet. Why should I? What's going on with you, Jasper? What aren't you telling me?" She narrowed her eyes and glared at me again.

"I don't have anything to tell you because there isn't anything _to_ do. I want you to stop because you'll only exhaust yourself. I don't like seeing you push yourself so hard."

"Jasper, next to you, my family is the only thing in the world that truly matters to me. I can't let it go. You all are my whole life, and I can't lose any of you. I have to do something." Her desperation mounted, permeating the air.

"I won't let her hurt anyone. I swear it. She won't touch any of you."

She stiffened and was filled with a whole different kind of concern.

"What are you planning?" she asked again, her voice nothing more than hissed air.

"I'm not planning anything," I answered again. I wasn't-at least not yet. "Truly, Alice. I'm not."

I felt her disappear for a moment, looking for a decision I might have made.

"You're sure?" she asked cautiously. She'd seen nothing.

"Alice, I'll protect you _and_ the Cullens. That's my decision, if you are looking for one. Exactly how that happens is still undecided."

She pursed her lips and glared. I knew that look.

"Instead of tattling on me to Edward for something I haven't done, why don't you let me hold you? I'd much rather spend my time in your arms, Mrs. Whitlock, than in worrying about my maker."

"You aren't fooling me, Jasper, but you're right, I'd rather be here with you than in the future with_ that_ woman. When this is over, I want to have you to myself for a whole week. Just you, nothing else, not even clothes." She finally relaxed and rolled her body over onto mine to snuggle down on my chest.

Then she disappeared for a moment.

"Alice."

"Sorry."

I focused my mind on loving my mate, forcing all thoughts of Maria into the dark place they belonged. It took longer than usual, but eventually, the colors of our love thrummed between us like a heartbeat.

x~X~x

"Flowers?" The words escaped my mouth before I could stop them. But honestly,_ flowers?_ Esme just looked up and smiled. Behind her smile was the need to act, to do something, anything, in the face of a threat.

"They brighten the room and might help things go smoother. Besides, maniacal murderer or not, she is our guest."

"Esme..." I began, but Edward butted in.

"Tried that; didn't work." Behind him Carlisle just shook his head. Esme was dealing with this the only way she could.

I smiled at her. "They're nice." I sent her what little peace I could, and she nodded at me before disappearing into the kitchen to clean up.

Alice went still beside me. "Maria may be bringing gifts," she said as she cocked her head. "Either that or she intends to kill us with hair combs. And a notebook."

"It is common practice to bring gifts when visiting someone," Carlisle said.

"Not for Maria," I reminded him.

"Dear God, where did that woman learn to dress herself?" Alice rolled her eyes. "She's definitely bringing something to us in a gaudy bag."

"I believe those are the traditional clothes of Mexico," Edward reminded her.

"Well this is 1966, and no one should wear pouffy sleeves like that."

"Perhaps with a potential battle ahead of us, we shouldn't worry too much about fashion," he said sarcastically.

Alice ran her eyes over his perfectly dressed form. He'd never admit it, none of us would, but he enjoyed dressing well and relied on Alice's fashion sense almost entirely. "You have no right to judge me or my fashion obsession. In fact, I think you are overdue for a wardrobe overhaul."

Edward went pale and narrowed his eyes. "Oh, no you don't. You can't distract me. Go ahead and fill your mind with as many useless fashion thoughts as you want. I'm still going to win." She grinned coyly at him, her typical look when she began her mental torment of Edward. She'd become a master at annoying him. "And I don't care what your visions show, Alice, they've been wrong before. Don't give me that..."

Carlisle's hand fell on my shoulder, and he motioned with his head towards his office. The concern on his face fit his mood perfectly.

He waited until the heavy door clicked shut before talking with me.

"Thank you for helping Esme. She's a strong woman, but this situation is hard on her," he said simply.

"Esme doesn't realize how strong she really is, and Maria is in the weaker position, despite all her care and watchfulness," I agreed. I said. The Cullens were nothing short of the strongest individuals I'd ever known. Their strength would make it easier to do what I needed.

"Let it go." The blunt statement was a quiet order. I looked into Carlisle's face and saw authority in it, still mixed with compassion, but there nonetheless. "Your rage does you no good."

"Edward," I hissed. I shoved my thoughts even deeper and cursed the mind reading snitch.

"No, and probably not now either. He's too busy listening for Maria. He wants to beat Alice at finding her for some reason." A smile played on his lips for a brief second. "I think they have a bet riding on it, though I told him it was useless to bet against her.

"No, this comes from me. I don't know what you plan or what you wish to happen, but I know how much Maria harmed you. I know how much you hate this life, and I have a fairly good grasp of men's hearts." He skewered me with his eyes.

"I will protect my mate and this coven," I said, no longer hiding my desire. I was fairly certain Edward wanted her eliminated as well.

"I have no doubt of that, Jasper. Sometimes, though, we forget where protection ends and revenge begins."

"I'm owed revenge."

"As are we all. The need for revenge and retaliation permeates our kind. It destroys us. Those vampires whose lives are entwined in the need for power or violence are consumed by it."

"You don't understand." I looked at him with his nearly perfect skin and miraculously perfect life. He couldn't possibly understand the need to destroy the source of a century of anguish.

"I was created as well," Carlisle said, his voice unwavering. "My life was stolen just as yours was. In return,I stole the lives of others, willingly and for my own benefit. I withheld my hand from the man who tortured and destroyed Esme in her human life even though we both deserved our revenge. I know a great deal about both wanting and deserving revenge. Jasper, focus on the life you have now, keep your eye on the man you have become, the man you want to be, and let Maria and your past go. You may find it frees you."

Before I could reply, we both heard Esme step to the door. "Now," she said.

"Did you win?" Carlisle asked Edward as we joined the family.

Edward grimaced and shook his head. Beside me, Alice snorted.

"I keep telling him, but he won't believe me."

We took our places just as last time. I felt Maria as Alice wrapped her arm around my waist. The soldier, the murderer, rose within me to meet the threat of my maker once again.

Three curt knocks sounded on the door. "Anything on her men yet?" breathed Carlisle. Both Alice and Edward shook their heads as Emmett leaned to open the door.

And I was in a storehouse in Galveston.

"_Is he done?" asked a sweet voice. I recognized it, but only barely. The pain was now a memory, but one that my body, this strange body, still trembled from. The excruciating burning returned in my throat, smaller now, but I knew instinctively it would be infinitely worse. My hand was at my throat before it should have been. For a moment, the feel of my skin under my fingers overwhelmed me. It was too much. Too smooth, too cold, too much feeling. I looked at my hand, and realized the room was pitch black. My eyes scanned the lightless room, and saw everything. Every splinter, every nail. I backed away from a something near me, something I felt but didn't see yet. _

"_Oh, yes," laughed a female voice, "he's done." _

_A vaguely familiar face appeared in a doorway to my right, beautiful and malevolent at the same time. _

_My body crouched and a feral growl, like that of an animal, ripped itself from my chest. The eyes of the beautiful one were red as blood._

_Pain flamed in my throat at the thought, and I swallowed involuntarily._

"_Are you thirsty, Jasper Whitlock? Do you want to ease the pain? Do you remember how much it hurt?" The new woman came near me, and this one I knew. I'd seen her up close when she kissed me. But it wasn't a kiss._

_Flames licked at my throat as the red of their eyes called to me, but I did not move. I couldn't tell who the enemy was._

_The familiar one, I could not recall her name, turned her head to the side. "Flame have your tongue, Major? The pain will increase unless you ease it. Let me show you how." Then the woman purred._

"_What ar—" I could not finish. The voice came from me, but it was too smooth, too perfect. I could taste gunpowder and smoke in the air. And something else. Something sweet._

_The first woman giggled, and I jumped back. Too far. I went through the wall. Cold rain hit my body, but did not chill me._

"_Stop Netty, you will scare him."_

"_I found a caravan," called the third voice I recognized. I whirled and faced her. She looked at me with wide eyes, and smiled. "He turned out well, didn't he?"_

"_Always thinking with your petticoats, aren't you Lucinda?" The one called Nettie laughed._

"_Do you remember me, Major Jasper Whitlock?" the one who'd… bit, yes, she bit me… asked._

_The deep voice said, "No, ma'am." Pain blazed in my throat, and my hand went to it in an attempt to cool it. _

"_Come, Jasper. I am Maria, and I can make the pain go away."_

_I knew instinctively that she wasn't telling the whole truth. I knew then if I followed her I would lose something. But I didn't know what it was, and in comparison with the pain, I didn't care. _

Even now, standing before my maker in a comfortable home surrounded by my family, the feeling of loss permeated me.

I pulled Alice close and held on tight.

Maria walked all the way into the home this time. She simply swept by Emmett and came into the middle of the room. She wore the regional clothing of Northern Mexico and carried a woven bag over her shoulder.

"Hello, Major Jasper Whitlock," she said with a wide smile and bright, red eyes.

Maria walked to the center of the room without so much as asking permission.

"Come now," she chided our silent group. "I'm not here to fight. You invited me back."

"I invited you back, if Jasper wanted you," said Emmett. "You are very lucky he did." He went chest to nose with Maria, and I was grateful again for the massive vampire.

"Oh, good," she looked around his chest. "I'm glad to know we can talk. So, you have a mate? I can't tell you how happy I was to hear that news. You deserve love, Jasper." She lied, though strangely, she was indeed happy. I simply didn't know why.

I buried everything but my watchfulness, and did what I had to do.

"Maria, this is Alice, my wife." Alice came around to the front of me and beamed at Maria.

"Hello, Maria. Jasper has told me _everything_ about you." I was proud as peaches of her. She was angry to the point of violence, but triumphant certainty also surged through her.

Jealousy crackled between them.

"And I have learned a _great _deal about you." Maria's smile was just as certain as Alice's. "You are very special, Alice, and even more so to have captured my solitary soldier so completely."

"Thank you," Alice smiled and scrunched her nose in that condescending way she has. "But it wasn't hard to catch him. He was more than eager to be caught by me." She hugged me closer and I bent down to kiss her. It was simply natural, and felt preposterously good to do. I felt a sharp prick of both jealousy and anger rise in Maria, so I kissed Alice more intimately.

"I brought you gifts," Maria said, calling attention back to herself. She'd always been good at that, being the center of attention. She looked around like the Cheshire Cat. No one moved.

Then Maria simply whirled on her heel, and sat down on the sofa and waved her hand, as if inviting the Cullens to sit in their own home. I'd forgotten how good she was at the intimidation game. Emmett chuckled, crossed his arms and leaned against the wall.

Alice was right, Maria was rude.

Finally, Esme stepped forward and smiled warmly. "That is very kind of you, thank you."

Maria beamed at her and reached into the bag. She brought out an exquisite silk scarf. Esme swallowed and reached for it with a nod and a quiet thank you. All of us knew someone had died for that item. What had once been standard practice for me now seemed morbid.

"Come, come," Maria motioned for Rosalie who simply stared at her. "Ah, a shy one."

"Not exactly," Rosalie snorted.

"I've brought a lovely set of combs all the way from my homeland. Won't you take them? They will look lovely in your hair," Maria cooed and held out the turquoise hair combs.

Rosalie's eyes shot to me for a brief second and I nodded. She stepped forward, said a curt thank you, and took the combs.

Maria grinned at her, and I realized she felt happy to give gifts away. She looked at me and smiled again, clearly pleased with herself. This was a new experience for her.

"And for Carlisle, a gift fit for a coven leader," she motioned to Emmett and drew out a long bladed knife with an intricately detailed leather sheath.

"Thank you," he said, his usual cheerful voice back. He grinned like the boy he is when he unsheathed the knife and watched it gleam in the light.

Maria turned her attention to Edward who stood near Carlisle as always. Uncertainty filtered through her as I saw her mouth twitch and eyebrow cock up at him. Instead of addressing Edward, she turned her attention to Carlisle, who held Esme at his side.

"And for the quiet doctor, isn't that right? How do you manage that, Emmett?" She smiled at Carlisle and handed him a hand bound leather notebook.

He stepped forward and took the intricately embellished tome as he began to explain his desire to help humans. I tuned him out and focused on Edward's face and mood. He was incensed, perhaps disgusted, and the muscles of his jaw twitched rapidly. Something in Maria's mind bothered him_._

Maria's attention turned back to Edward as she pulled out a pair of kid gloves. "And for your... son? Or is he something else?" She pointed between the three of them with a questioning look on her face.

Emmett choked back a laugh, and I realized then what Maria saw: two male vampires standing almost arm to arm. Vampires, especially male ones, never stand that close. Ever.

Edward skewered me with his eyes, and I grinned for the first time in days.

"I created both my mate and my _son_," Carlisle said easily, "and I don't confuse the two." Edward quickly stepped aside and forward and took the gloves from Maria.

"You have such nice cars, though I don't know why you bother. I thought perhaps you could use the gloves while driving."

Edward's jaw continued to pulse, but he managed to say thank you and accepted the gift.

Maria's eyes flew to Alice and I, and for a split second, her mood turned predatory. "Ah, my major and his bride. Did you call her your 'wife' Jasper? Did you marry?"

"Yes we did," Alice said with an easy smile. "Sixteen years ago. It was a lovely ceremony."

"Ah, interesting." Besides her pathological need to horde religious icons and ban on killing priests, she never bothered with the customs of men. "Well, I've brought you something rather special, Jasper." Anticipation radiated from her. She pulled out an ancient piece of faded yellow cloth with tarnished buttons sewn on it. It was wrapped around an old revolver. "I believe you had one of these before you were changed." In her hand was a cuff from a Confederate uniform and a Colt six shooter. "I thought it might remind you of your life and our long heritage together."

Maria held the gun out to me, still full of anticipation.

I looked at it, but for a moment couldn't move. Flashes of memories—dark, human ones of hunger and conflict, and clear, vampiric ones of thirst and death—held me in my place. I felt Alice's arms tighten their grip on me. My hand went out and took the gift.

"Is it mine?"

"Who knows?" Maria said with a shrug. I swallowed against the venom that pooled in my mouth at the memory of that day. "I took a great many officers then, but only you remained with me. I've missed you."

I didn't respond.

"We can put that with our other mementoes," Alice said. She pumped love and concern at me, and I anchored myself with them. "Thank you. I'm sure he will treasure these."

I looked into her beautiful yellow eyes, and felt the surge of first love once again. My past receded from the present, driven back to its place by the angel beside me. I turned back to Maria.

"Thank you, Maria. I will keep them as a link to my human life."

Maria nodded but didn't smile. That wasn't the response she wanted.

"And for your lovely bride." Maria turned to Alice, and my mate stiffened just a bit. Maria pulled out a large ruby pendant. It was tarnished, obviously made in the last century by Spanish craftsmen. Alice smiled and stepped forward to take it.

"Thank you, Maria. It's beautiful. I'll remember you every time I wear it."

Which I knew she never would.

Silence filled the space between us until Maria sighed heavily. "I do bite, but I promise not to bite any of you. Please, sit. Let's talk about ourselves and our lives. I've come a long way to find out how you are doing, Jasper, and I want to hear everything. How did you come to be a part of this coven?"

We looked at each other, and with a nod from me, Emmett sat across from Maria and leaned in on her. It was a perfect stance for a coven leader. We followed his lead and sat in various places around the room.

"Jasper and Alice joined us in nineteen-fifty. They'd heard about a coven that ate animals, which Alice already practiced. They just drove up and asked to live here. I said yes." He grinned and shrugged as if it was the most normal of days.

"You simply let them in?" She looked around at our faces as if she couldn't quite believe it.

"Not quite that easily," Alice said. Her stance shifted and relaxed. "We scared them at first, and of course, had to move quite a bit of furniture around." She grinned at Edward.

"They took my room," he stated flatly.

"You have a room of your own?" Maria brightened considerably and smiled at Edward. "Is it private?"

"We buy homes that are large enough to accommodate all the coven members," explained Esme a little too quickly.

"_Buy_ homes?"

"We try to live like the humans around us, and that includes making real estate purchases. In the time our coven has been together, we've owned seven homes. They make good investments, and make it easy to re-visit cities if we want."

Maria nodded at Esme while looking at her as if she were insane. "And the furnishings?" Maria pointed around the well appointed room.

"Some we take with us and some we leave in a safe place. We may come back here again in a century or so."

"I have a storehouse full of my spoils at my estate in Monterrey," Maria said proudly. "It's filled to the roof with my war trophies. The city remains my base, but I also control many smaller towns. Unfortunately the vast lands Jasper and I once ruled have shrunk considerably in the last few decades." She glanced at me. "Perhaps you would like to re-visit your old home one day, Jasper. You would be more than welcome. Bring your coven and come enjoy the hospitality of the South."

I felt it then. The desperate need that permeated her on the first visit flashed through the room. That and the bitter feelings of a lie infused with loathing. She didn't want me just visiting. She wanted her land back, and now that I had Alice, we were her key to achieving that goal.

"Don't you remember the glory of it, Jasper? Don't you remember the joy of having a city to feed upon?" Her red eyes shone with memories of death and feasting. My throat ached in response.

"I don't remember the glory, Maria. All I remember was lies and death. The only thing I left with were scars so deep they will mark me forever. I'm not that soldier any longer."

She glared at me and licked her lips.

"Jasper is a member of our coven now," Emmett said, a growl underlying each word. "He doesn't live to kill any longer, and we will protect his right to stay with us."

"I know you are fond of religious articles, Maria. I've collected a great many of them in my years. Would you care to see them?" Carlisle's calm voice broke the tension. Maria smiled at him, but under the smile loathing bared its teeth.

"Thank you, Emmett. I would indeed like to see the collection and explore this lovely home. Perhaps your son would accompany me?" She slid over to Edward's side.

Across the room Rosalie beamed at me and winked at Emmett.

"Certainly. I'm sure Edward would enjoy showing you around, though I'm afraid our home will not match the grandeur of yours. And, of course we will allow you to take a piece of my collection. You don't even need to ask," Carlisle said.

Maria cocked an eyebrow at him but said nothing. The mindreading trick caught her off guard. I looked at Edward, and silently asked if Maria was buying the ruse, but Edward didn't respond. In fact, the only thing plastered to Edward's face was a stiff smile. Disgust oozed out of him so thickly his skin should have been coated with slime. He held out his hand, and Maria took it and linked her arm around his.

"Are you coming, my major?" she purred. I smiled at her and nodded as my body wanted to retch. I flanked her as Edward, Esme and Carlisle began leading her through the home, discussing art and antiques. Alice clung to my arm and sent me her victorious certainty. She must have seen Maria leave.

x~X~x

It took almost two hours to complete Maria's visit. Carlisle spoke with her about the history of vampires and the various religious practices of the cultures he'd known. Esme talked about the Cullen's various homes. Alice showed her the album of our wedding. Emmett remained silent, but watchful, just as a suspicious coven leader would.

I only answered her questions or commented on my life as necessary. She watched us all, but mostly Alice and I. All along, her face remained as friendly as it could look while fury rose in waves. She asked me of my memories, of what I missed, of what I did now. I explained everything truthfully, each answer chipping away at the obnoxious hope she held on to. She vacillated between the strange happiness and intense desperation. It was an impossible mix.

At last, we returned to the living room. She fingered the ancient rosary Carlisle had given her as a gift and stared into space.

"When will you return to Monterrey?" I asked, pushing her.

"I intend to stay here a while and get to know your amazing coven, Jasper."

"How long?" Emmett demanded.

"As long as I want," she said with a dismissed wave. "Your coven protects Calgary, but not as hunting grounds. I will not harm your home or city. I see no reason why I cannot stay."

"Don't you need to keep an eye on Monterrey?" Rosalie asked.

"I left the city in good hands."

"That's a mighty big risk for you to take, Maria," I reminded her.

"Don't worry, Jasper. The vampires there will obey me. I've become much better at choosing my companions. So, you see, we have a great deal of time to talk and get reacquainted with each other." She turned to leave, but looked back at us. "I'm glad you liked your gifts, and I thank you for yours. If you ever come see me in Monterrey, there will be many more." Her last words were aimed at Alice.

I nearly laughed. The Cullen's wealth was far more vast than anything Maria would ever amass, and Alice was the reason for it. Maria saw my smirk, but her reaction wasn't what it should have been. Instead of anger, she seemed almost victorious.

As if by being here, she'd won.

"You may stay here so long as no humans die," said Emmett. Maria's dismissive attitude towards him rankled his nerves. "That isn't negotiable. You and your men must eat far from here, and if we hear of more deaths, we will defend our territory. You understand territory, don't you?"

"You learned about the car? It was only an accident. Those happen sometimes," she shrugged it off. "However, neither I nor my men will hunt in this area."

"Kill, Maria. You cannot _kill _in this area," I pushed. Maria rarely ate from a local population, but she preferred to dine in the comfort of her own home.

"Yes, I understand," she said with an innocent smile. "If you change your mind, Jasper, let me know. I will be back again soon and we can talk more then." And she was gone.

I knew then that she had no intention of leaving us. She would remain here until she had what she came for. I ignored the powerful desire growing within me. Edward bristled but did not emit concern. My thoughts were still hidden.


	5. Chapter 5

A huge thank you to Smitten By Twilight, my beta for this chapter. She pushed and prodded until I got it finished. It belongs to Stephenie Meyer, but I'm playing with it my way.

* * *

**April 29, 1966**

_**Jasper**_

"Go back? Are you insane?"

The room cringed at Rosalie's shrill voice.

"We can't stay trapped here forever, Rosalie," Carlisle calmly responded.

"I think it's a good idea," Emmett agreed.

I looked up from the table and glanced at Edward. _Could__he__be__any__more__obvious?_

Edward rolled his eyes.

Emmett wanted a fight, and he didn't care how he got it. All of us "boys" did, but he didn't even try to hide that fact.

"It's the only way to find her lair," I said, looking at Rosalie. "Besides, you hate being stuck here, remember?"

"I need to return to my patients, and you all need to return to school. If we continue to hide from her, she'll believe she's won a small victory, and we can't let that happen," Carlisle said.

"Are you absolutely sure?" Esme asked Edward.

"She desperately wants Jasper and Alice, and she finds the rest us oddly amusing. Her mind is like a whirlwind over a swamp, all swirling chaos and decay. However, she truly has no plans to fight us, at least none she thought of when she was here."

"If we return to our lives, we stand a better chance of finding her scent in the city," Carlisle said gently to his wife.

"We'll be close enough to each other in Calgary that we can easily join each other if there's an issue, but Carlisle's right, we can't let her think she's won." I refused to allow her to think that. "Esme, you and I can track their scents during the day. With the military radios Emmett bought, we can stay in contact and Alice can warn us if anything changes." I conveyed my certainty to Esme. I _needed_ to find Maria's lair, and I could only do that if we searched.

I felt Edward's interest in me, but my mind was too busy plotting out a search grid to let him hear any other thoughts.

Rosalie crossed her arms and leaned back so hard that the heavy oak chair cracked.

"She hasn't changed her plans," said Alice. She nodded as her eyes became unfocused again. "It isn't likely that you find anything, Jazzy, because I see us return tonight."

"It seems safe enough, though," Edward agreed, interpreting Alice's vision with her.

"Fine. We'll try this stupid plan, but so help me, you'd better not be doing this to start a fight." Rosalie poked her fingers at the three of us before storming out.

"There won't be a fight. I can almost guarantee it," Alice assured Esme.

"I hope you're right," said Esme.

"I hope you're wrong," mumbled Emmett. He winked at Alice and then ducked out of the room, avoiding Esme's angry glare.

"We'd better get ready for our day," said Alice, her gaze still unfocused. "It'll be quite sunny by mid-day. Make sure you're in a building before one. We'll have to stay and study in the library for an hour or so. It should cloud up again around four."

"Just keep the radios nearby," Carlisle said to Esme. He glanced at me and then kissed his wife. "Trust us, my love."

Alice smiled at Esme. "Let's go choose your outfit today. We need something that allows a large bag to fit the radio in."

Esme slowly made her way out of the room discussing the day's outfit with Alice.

"Jasper-" Carlisle began.

"I'll take care of her, Carlisle, I swear it." I said it so quietly that neither of the girls heard.

"Thank you." His eyes showed all the worry he hid. I realized how much faith he'd placed in me. And I realized how much that faith meant to me.

I would protect Esme, just as if she was my own family. Because she was.

They all were. Despite my best efforts to stay distant from these odd, angelic monsters, they'd become important to me, if for nothing more than Alice.

"We only have an hour before we leave. I suggest we get ready," Carlisle said.

I barely heard him. I was too focused on the odd feelings coming from Edward.

x~X~x

We searched in vain for two days. Two days of watchful pretense and growing tension. The only thing Alice saw was an argument among Maria's men, but I knew she'd have to move soon. She couldn't hold off her hunger for long, and sooner or later, she'd need to hunt.

Several times in our excursions around Calgary, Esme and I caught the scents of the others, but they always disappeared into open fields or dense forest, looping around in a continuous weaving dance as we followed them and they followed us.

A pattern slowly emerged, but I hid that thought under layer upon layer of strategy.

Carlisle and Esme attended an estate auction on Saturday, more to help Esme relax than to look for Maria.

Alice and Rosalie joined them, and I used the excuse to walk around the old, stately neighborhood. We hadn't hunted in more than a week and I couldn't be in a room full of humans. There, amid Victorian mansions, I caught the unmistakable scents of both Maria and Hernandez. The paths intersected too closely and in too many places, and I knew somewhere in this neighborhood of old homes, churches, and schools, Maria hid her lair.

I searched until I heard Carlisle's voice call to me over the sounds of the houses and humans. His tone sent a spike of fear through me.

Cursing the light and the need to appear human, I rushed to them as quickly as I could. Carlisle and Esme headed to the car, each supporting Alice whose face was perfectly blank.

"They're planning to hunt," Esme said as I took Alice's arm from her. Alice didn't return to us until Carlisle drove out of the neighborhood.

"They're arguing about where. The men want to hunt here, but Maria is insisting they do it far away from Calgary." Alice's voice was choppy as she both watched the vision and tried to tell us about it. She stayed silent for the remainder of the trip home, lost in the half world she lived in.

~O~

**May 2nd, 1966**

"If we split up, we can track their hunting party and look for the lair," Emmett argued.

"I'm not comfortable with splitting the family," Carlisle said, looking to me.

If we did separate, he and I would lead the two groups.

"I agree with Carlisle. In this instance, we only need to worry about the hunters, and they can lead us back to the lair if we successfully track them."

"I don't know if all of them are hunting, but the group will be large," Alice said.

"Maria isn't among them, though." Edward knit his eyebrows together and looked at me.

"She doesn't usually go but rather has her minions bring humans back to her," I replied to his unasked question.

"We warned her not to feed here," Emmet said, growling the last word.

"I don't know that she'll risk it. Most likely, she's not made up her mind yet," I said.

"Either way, we should track them to ensure that they don't hunt here, and try to follow them back when they're done," Carlisle said.

"And if they do hunt here?" Emmett crossed his arms and glared at each of us.

"We'll make that decision if or when it comes," Carlisle answered.

"I can't tell yet where they'll feed. But I see the possibility of a fight," Alice warned. She glanced at me quizzically, and Edward looked at her, but neither of them said anything.

We needed to be close enough to Calgary to track them as they left, but far enough away to stay hidden. Edward and Alice worked at interpreting her constantly shifting visions while Emmett and I got the black backpacks and army radios ready in the workshop. With some help from Rosalie and Edward, we were able to shrink the size of the bulky surplus items to a much more manageable size.

Carlisle watched in facination as we loaded them into the packs.

"And Alice says these will soon become even smaller?" he asked as he held the loaf sized radio in his hands. "It seems almost impossible, but if they can try to put a man on the moon, I suppose they can do almost anything."

"I refuse to be impressed until I get a flying car or a jet pack," said Emmett with a snort. "Or a phaser. I'd be happy with one of those. Hey, do you think a phaser could kill one of us?"

Carlisle and I simply looked at him.

"Aw, come on! You can't tell me you haven't at least wondered about that."

"No, son, I honestly haven't."

I had, but there was no way I'd admit it.

Emmett rolled his eyes at Carlisle and packed the last radio.

"Could you take these to the others? I wish to speak with Jasper."

Emmett shrugged and took the backpacks into the house singing "Someone's in trouble" on his way in.

"I wanted to thank you for keeping Esme safe over the last few days," Carlisle said, but his mood told me thankfulness wasn't the reason he was here.

I raised my eyebrows and waited. He chuckled and sat on a stool, a blatantly human move, but it relaxed me just as he intended it to.

"Alice is still worried about you, and so am I."

I bristled. "I've told you that I won't let harm come to any of you."

"I believe you, Jasper. But that's not why I'm worried. You still haven't decided what you'll do about your maker, have you?"

I felt my muscles tense.

"I know you won't do anything to endanger the family. I also know how much you need to protect Alice, but there is a great danger in your next decision, Jasper. Most of our kind never worries about the human they once were. They become narcissistic monsters, only caring that their needs are met. The only way to keep the human alive within us is to starve the monster who desires to kill everything we once were. You've struggled against that murderous creature a long time, and he still controls you in many ways. You're at a crossroads, and you must make sure that the choices you now make are the right ones for you, whoever you choose to be."

I looked into his kind, dark eyes, but before I could answer, Rosalie called us into the home. They'd begun their hunt.

Alice saw six forms running, and we intercepted their path two miles south of the city. We followed them south, letting them lead us by half a mile. Alice's visions and Edward's mind reading guided us as we ran.

I stayed with my mate, guarding her as she fluctuated between what was and what would be. Maria's men loped along a rural road, heading down towards the southwestern logging camps to feed, just as Alice saw.

They only made it five miles outside of the city. "Stop!" Alice gasped. She halted and I relayed the warning to the family. "They've hidden in a dense copse of trees by a jutting limestone outcropping."

Edward was at Alice's side in an instant, his radio out. "They hear a truck coming, and they've decided to attack it instead." His words were barely loud enough to be heard.

"Can we kill them _now_?"

"Whisper!" commanded Carlisle, Edward, and myself all at once. I heard the unmistakable sound of Rosalie's hand contacting Emmett's head.

"Jasper agrees with Emmett and thinks we should go ahead and attack, but I need more time. Their minds are conflicted between obeying Maria and taking the truck. They need it for some reason." Edward shot me an apologetic look.

"If we attack them outright, we will suffer injuries," hissed Alice.

Edward's face clouded. "Or worse."

"We can't let them kill this close to Calgary," Carlisle whispered. "When will—"

Tires skidded on gravel, and a human screamed. Edward's face contorted.

I felt Alice under my arm as she stiffened and then relaxed. I didn't even realize I'd had my arm around her.

"They're going to feed and then fill the truck with humans to take back. We don't have a choice. We have to attack." Alice looked up at me and then to Edward.

"We'll come around your right flank," said Carlisle. "Emmett, take up the left. Edward, Alice?"

"Let them feed and take the truck," Alice said, her voice toneless. "We can attack them while they drive." I relayed the information to Emmett and Carlisle. We heard the tires of the truck crunch as it drove away from us.

It only took a minute to converge on the truck from the back and sides in a classic attack formation. At my command, Emmett launched himself at the side of vehicle, sending it down a steep embankment. We all latched on and rolled with it, tearing our way in while it was still in motion.

The driver was the first to attack, throwing himself at Carlisle. He didn't even make it through the window before Esme's hands yanked his head back and her foot kicked his body away from it.

Our gentle mother got the first kill.

"I win," called Alice, and Edward growled in response.

"Leave me one!" yelled Rosalie from inside the truck. A snap and howl sounded and pieces of vampire were tossed out the Emmett sized hole in the side of the truck.

The four others made a run for it.

Edward, Alice and I took off after the first one. Edward had him down before he topped the incline.

A blond male wriggled his way out from under the truck, and Emmett jumped out his hole to pursue the fleeing vampire. Rosalie ran after him with a look of fury on her face.

Carlisle and Esme tracked the third, so I ran after the last one, an Asian male whose emotions showed him to be a novice at battle.

The one I chased ran as quickly as Edward and headed directly for the city but cut to the right before reaching it. I took a chance and ran towards the neighborhood we'd found earlier in a risky attempt to catch the fast vampire. I knew he headed for Maria, and I couldn't let him reach her with the news of what we'd done.

The dangerous ploy worked, and I caught him as he came from the east. His eyes were fixed on a large school building, and he didn't see me until I landed on his back and ripped his head from his body. He let out one, short cry before I severed his head. Not much, but we were near a neighborhood and I couldn't take any chances. I couldn't even properly tear him apart because the noise might attract attention and would tip Maria's remaining men off. Instead, I snapped his legs and arms and carried them back into the shelter of a thicket. Edward and Alice could find him there.

The radio on my back beeped. I ripped it from my pack and crushed it, laying it next to the body. I couldn't let it give me away, or let the family stop me.

Under the cover of darkness, I ran through the streets toward a massive three-story school. She'd chosen children to hide and shield her.

I let my senses guide me. Two humans remained inside, perhaps caretakers or custodians. I felt Hernandez above me on the roof, anxious, edgy and ready for battle.

He'd never let me pass, and I'd be forced to destroy him. My mouth twisted into a smile.

I didn't even try to hide as I approached the building. Hernandez met my challenge head on, jumping down from the roof and landing between me and the building. I raised my hands and backed away into a small thicket, leading him away from spying windows.

"I only need to talk with her," I said to him.

He leered at me, knowing my lie for what it was.

"You aren't going near her. I don't know what she sees in you, but I won't let you take my place again. You ran like the bastard coward you are and deserve death, not a second chance."

"I don't want to fight you." Again, a lie, but it sounded good.

He roared with laughter and launched himself at me. I used Carlisle's small flip, and sent him flying. He attacked again, but to no avail. His moves remained the same after all these years, and all I had to do was deflect him until he tried that roundhouse kick.

"Look at you! Yellow eyes and dancing like that pretty little girl of yours. I'll keep your head with me so you can watch while I kill her too." His smile was predatory. "Are you ready to die?"

"Nope, but you're welcome to try."

And in frustration, he executed a perfect roundhouse kick with two vicious, cutting jabs, just as I knew he would.

I let the monster take control and grabbed his leg at the thigh, slammed my foot onto his other foot to keep it there, and pulled him apart from the crotch.

He didn't even have time to scream.

I drug the parts of him up to the roof and left the pieces where they fell. He couldn't put himself together soon enough to make any difference. I'd burn him and Maria together, if I was around to light the match.

The roof showed marks of constant use, and the smell of decay led me to a small opening that marked the passage to Maria's lair. It lay somewhere below me at the bottom of a long airshaft, which had been modified to fit a single body. Hernandez's scent mingled with the smell of rotting corpses. And blood.

I dropped to the bottom and landed in hell.

Around me were a dozen humans, most of them dead. She'd fed recently, and the bodies were only now starting to decay. As always, she'd left some alive as snacks, not caring about what the sight of slaughter did to them.

The few that lived were no longer sentient.

There was food for them and buckets for their needs, but like cattle in a slaughterhouse, Maria did no more than necessary to keep their hearts pumping.

Fear, pain, madness and hopelessness pounded me.

Wide eyes watched me as terror descended upon the three that remained. They pulled further into the walls, dragging their useless legs up, as if they could hide from me. She'd broken at least one leg on each, shattering the bones with her hands so that they couldn't run when thirst seized her.

The monster roared for their blood, and agony flared in my throat. My mouth became a consuming fire. The little sanity that remained slipped away, and I turned to the closest human. But before I could act, my mind went to another dark place.

The memory of that darkness was crystal clear.

"_I can't," I rasp against the inferno in my throat and against the demon that pushes my muscles to kill and eat. " I was supposed to save them." My strong arms wrap around my body in an attempt to keep myself in place. The only thing saving the women and children below me is the wind at my back. I smell salt water in the air instead of blood._

_I try to remember what I was before the burning. I'd had a life and a purpose, but it's hazy now, lost in the flames of hell I'd endured. I know this, though: I don't harm helpless women and children; I rescue them and keep them safe. The gray wool pants and shredded uniform shirt that still cling to my body tell me that._

_The woman called Nettie snorts. "You got one with a conscience? You're slipping, Maria."_

"_You can't kill women and children, Jasper?" The one named Maria taunts me. "Your officer's heart endured the flames? Fine, I will take you where you can feast without killing any women or children. Would you like that? Don't you want to ease the burning? It will feel so good to have the pain end."_

_I swallow yet again against the fire of my throat, but the burning only grows more intense, and I moan against it, much to my shame. _

_I try to answer, to shake my head no and turn away from the red eyes that mock me, but I can't. The crimson color calls to me in a siren song I can't ignore._

"_Will you let me help you? Do you want to stop the flames?" she asks, gloating over me._

"_Yes," I whimper against the searing pain._

"_Good, Jasper. Follow me, then." Her smile sends tendrils of terror down my spine, but I follow her as she runs. The running eases the pain, but only a little._

_The world flashes by me too fast, yet I see it in intricate detail. As I run, the monster within me grabbs hold of my mind and digs its claws deep into the silence where my heart should have beat. I'm becoming something evil. Something that feeds on human blood. I crave it. All of it._

_I don't realize what Maria's done until we top a hill. The sweet smell of blood hits me like a cannon. If I'd thought the pain unendurable before, it is nothing compared to what bursts through my body. My throat melts from the heat. My very bones are on fire._

_I descend on the medical tent, nothing but mad, mindless thirst. Two figures rise, a white coated doctor and a young aide. I drain them both, severing the head of the lad in my frenzy. Then, I attack the prone forms of the wounded men. Shots ring out, and then cries, but I dodn't care._

_I throw the fifth body down, roaring in victory and in the incredible, powerful joy of feeding. Just as I turn to my next prey, a strange feeling overwhelms me. Fear and betrayal. I whirl and look into the terrified eyes of my corporal._

"_Major?" he asks. He holds out his bandaged hand to me, confusion crossing his face. The man I'd once been begs for the young man's life, but the monster only grins, enjoying the terror in his eyes. My teeth sink into his throat, cutting off his cry, silencing both him and the feelings._

"_Good, Jasper." Maria stands at the tent opening. _

_I growl at her and crouch, enraged that she might claim my food. She only laughs._

_I turn back to the remaining three men. I kill them all, caring for nothing but the incredible ecstasy that is human blood._

_I drink so much it hurts to drain the last struggling man. I rise slowly, feeling as if I will burst from the massive feast._

_I look around and suddenly understand what I've done. They were my men. Mine. _

_I scream. I think it is a word, but I'll never know. My full body that has just glutted itself on their very lives, retches, and their blood splatters across the floor._

_Maria purrs from the doorway. "Yes, young one. You did well. I knew you wanted this, my major. Now, you are a soldier of hell, immortal and unstoppable. You are a demon, a killer, and your battles are now for the blood that soothes you."_

_I know she's right. I am a son of hell, damned now and forever. The monster within me gloats, engorged with both blood and triumph._

That same monster now screamed for the blood of the suffering humans at my feet. It heard the weak thrum of heartbeats, calling an irresistible siren song.

I would give in just as I always had.

But one human's fear called me back. The one that saw me in the dark pleaded silently. The other two simply rocked against the wall, no longer in their right minds.

I wanted them, just as I did that first time. The searing thirst filled my mind, demanding to be satiated. But I wasn't quite the son of hell any longer.

Closing my eyes against the pain, I sent out peace and numbing calm and broke their necks. They couldn't live, but I made sure they felt nothing as they died.

Maria would pay for every life I'd snuffed out.

This makeshift dungeon was once an old boiler room. The stone walls and massive fire door ensured that no human outside these walls heard the terrifying misery of what happened within them.

The door swung open soundlessly, and I walked into Maria's opulent lair. She'd been watching us for weeks by the look of it. Rich fabrics and tapestries covered the walls of an old supply room. Six plush chairs hugged the wall of the small space, just as Edward had seen. The smell told me this place wasn't used by humans, probably just an old closet lost to the human world through the years.

There was a door at the other side of the dark room and I slid it open without a sound. Maria wouldn't need a sound, though. The smallest shift in pressure, the minutest smell of rancid, blood-laden air was enough.

Maria's anxiety spiked.

I had to be careful now, not only for my safety, but also for the safety of the few humans who still walked around upstairs. I paused on a step. Eighteen years ago, I'd have eaten the humans upstairs, believing them to be nothing more than collateral losses. Now, I was deliberately trying to keep them safe.

Carlisle's voice returned to me. "You're at a crossroads, and you must make sure that the choices you now make are the right ones for you, whoever you choose to be."

I shook my head to rid myself of him. He had no place here.

"I would have happily let you in our front door," came Maria's voice. I topped the stairs and looked at her. This was another storage room, but the humans still used this one. The walls were lined with metal shelves and several had been moved to block this portion of the room. Maria used this area as a sitting room. The Dick Van Dyke show played on the television in the corner and several more luxurious chairs littered the room. Hers was the gaudy green overstuffed Queen Anne. The only light came from the television and two truncheon windows high above us. We were still in the belly of the large building.

Maria smiled at me, her mood triumphant.

"I knew you'd come to me. I knew you weren't like them. Did you see what I have in the basement? There are more coming, and we can feast like the old days."

She didn't yet realize I'd killed Hernandez. She was happy to see me. My maker didn't yet know I was here to destroy her.

The monster urged me to leap on her and finish this. But the man had grown strong during the last eighteen years.

"I saw what you have, Maria. I don't want it."

Her eyes narrowed. "What do you want, then?"

And I laughed at her.

"Hernandez!"

"He's in pieces on the roof. He wouldn't let me pass."

Her eyes flashed. "You didn't need to do that," she hissed. Her body and mood shifted; she tensed and took a fighting stance.

"Yes I did. I don't know what you're playing at here, but you haven't been truthful since you came. You pose a threat to everything I hold dear, and I can't let you destroy what I've finally found."

She hissed again and deepened her stance. "Jasper, I'm not a threat. I want you back, yes, both you and your mate, but I don't want to hurt you. I've forgiven your trespass."

"You've forgiven _me_?"

"You left without so much as a goodbye. You left me at the mercy of the covens around me, without a replacement or a hope. I wanted you dead for a long time. I even sent men after you to kill you. But I'm no longer angry, and I forgive you now that I've seen how happy you are." She smiled in an almost maternal fashion. I shuddered. The last thing I wanted was to think of her as my mother.

"You forgive me. Me? I ran from the hell that was my life, Maria. The hell you made all of us live through. You lied to us all and killed us at your whim. You made me into a monster," I spat. I circled her, and she crouched in her defense.

"I only made you a vampire. You're the one that fed the monster. It was your choice, Jasper. I only gave you what you wanted. Remember the power? The blood? The feel of triumph, of knowing you were king? I made you a god." She stood tall, defiant. She knew I had the advantage in a fight.

"If it was so good, why did we kill all your creations? Do you remember them? Do you even remember the names? Or did those memories die in the flames? Do you remember wanting to kill me?"

She gave a small humorless cackle. "You wanted to kill me, too." She waved her hand as if to brush away all the unspoken hate between us. "Of course, we wanted to kill each other. It's the way of covens. And what I did to you made you strong. Look at you! Only a member of the Volturi could possibly fight you in battle, and my money would still be on you. With your mate at your side, you'd be unstoppable." She gave me another haughty smile, as if she was offering something wonderful.

"I know you, Jasper Whitlock. I know what you desire, the thing that brings you bliss. Imagine what we can do now. Imagine what I could give to your Alice. I would protect her, you know. I would never let danger come near her. And you could feast like we did before. You remember the feeling of blood flowing freely, don't you? Don't you remember the joy of it, Jasper?"

She moved around to my right side. I let her slide beside me. The monster crowed in victory as my fury rose in a crushing wave, and I prepared to rid the earth of my maker. The presence of the humans only aided my murderous thoughts. No more innocent lives would be lost. All she had to do was come closer, to whisper to me like she used to.

I baited her in. "What could you give my Alice that she doesn't have here?"

"I would make her a queen," Maria cooed as she inched closer. She was within my reach. My revenge was at hand.

I kept utterly still and relaxed my muscles. Tension would tip her off.

"I'm not angry, Jasper. I understand why you left, and I'm happy you found a mate, but I know you. I know you better than the yellow-eyed coven. Carlisle doesn't understand your need for blood. You are the consummate vampire, and I can make sure you stay that way. You can be king of your own city, and I will be your ally. Just say so, and I will give you everything you want."

My hand ached to tear at her. I wanted Maria to feel the pain of a hundred years of suffering. A hundred years of soulless sin.

I prepared to finish her, to end her evil. I'd longed for this moment, for this final retribution. I had to do this; I had no other choice.

But I did have a choice.

I wasn't that soulless killer any longer. I'd become someone else, something else, neither fully human nor fully vampire. I'd become Cullen.

My hand froze for a moment, unwilling to move, and then I felt them. They'd killed the others and were approaching the school. In this pit of hellish agony and hatred, the Cullens felt like sunlight, pure and clear.

Alice, Edward, Rosalie, Emmett, and most of all Esme and Carlisle. Each one was a point of light in this dark place—lights in my dark life.

They were getting closer. If I waited a moment longer, it would be too late. Then, my arms relaxed, because it already was.

"Yes, Jasper," she cooed. She'd mistaken my hesitation. "I know you want the old life back. I saw it in your eyes the second you came to me. Stay with me, and I can give you everything you desire. I know you, I know what you want."

"I want to walk in the sunlight." And my anger burned to ash and washed away in waves of pity. "I want to love my mate and live with my family. You don't even know what it is to be at peace, do you?" I asked. "You honestly think I want the life you have, don't you?"

"I told you the truth, Jasper. The cities grow larger by the day. With Carlos gone, we could take his lands and rule together. I help you and you help me. Your mate could live like a queen. You could buy her everything she wanted, and live in peace in any home of your choosing. I know you, you aren't like those pale eyed vampires. You want power, power and blood, and to rule your destiny. I can give you that if you will just join me." She was desperate, not because of fear, but because of desire.

As if a haze lifted from my eyes, I finally saw Maria clearly.

"You truly came here to try and get me back," I said, incredulous. "The attack on the house, the visits, the gifts, creating this nest with a horde of humans, they were all meant to try and get me back." I watched the wretched woman before me. She wasn't a threat now, and perhaps never was. She wasn't a power to be defeated. She was a pathetic immortal, and I felt sorry for her.

"All of it, Jasper, yes." She was nodding, anxiously watching me. "I once knew love, but he was taken from me. You are the closest thing I've ever had to a family. I miss you and want you back. Tell me your price, and I'll pay it."

"You can't afford my price," I said, with a rush of relief. "Alice and I have more money than you've ever dreamt of having. We could have anything we want, anything at all. Do you know what we want? A family. A place of peace. Each other. That's all, Maria. That is my price, and you can't pay it." I looked her over, and my mouth twitched into a smile. "You have no power over me."

Maria stepped back, unsure of what I meant.

I laughed at her. "You tortured me for decades, destroyed me slowly with your lies, and you deserve death many times over. I came here to kill you." The anger completely disappeared, replaced by the feelings of love and concern as the family approached.

Maria's eyes narrowed and she hissed as she leapt to the far side of the room.

I sent a message to Edward while Maria's face contorted with her torn desires. Desperation rose in waves until broken glass shattered the silence, and she once again went into a defensive stance.

Edward and Emmett dropped down from the truncheon windows. A second later, two doors ripped open, and Carlisle, Esme and Alice entered the room. I held up my hands to show them that they didn't need to attack.

"She's leaving."

"Are you all right?" Carlisle asked, surveying the room.

"I am now."

"And you _still_ didn't kill her?" said Emmett incredulously.

Alice was at my side in an instant. Anger, relief and love mixed together in a Gordian knot of emotions. Mostly anger. I was in trouble.

"I forgive you too, Maria." It wasn't entirely true, but one day I hoped it would be. "You did me painful wrong, but without you, I'd have never found Alice. So, in a way, I have you to thank for the incredible joy that is my life now. You deserve death, and I deserve revenge, but you gave me Alice, and that's worth everything to me."

Alice radiated smugness. I could tell by her face that she wanted to stick her tongue out at Maria, but she refrained.

"I came to kill you, to exact justice and vengeance, but I no longer want that burden. Go home to Monterrey. Do as you choose, but don't come find me again. Ever. I may someday come visit, but if you come near my coven again, I will kill you." I wrapped my arm around my mate, and let completeness heal the pain of separation.

Alice's arm constricted around me. I gripped my precious bride and kissed her head.

Carlisle once said forgiveness was like the slow release of an invisible trap, and as I stood there, the stranglehold of my past loosened.

"Your men are dead, all of them," said Emmett as he came forward to challenge Maria. She turned her face to him, shock evident in her features even as she tried to hide it. "We had no choice. I won't allow any more killing in an area controlled by my coven. It's the cost of crossing a coven such as ours."

Maria looked at the faces around her.

"We don't intend to kill you, but you must leave," said Carlisle. "And I wouldn't try that. It won't work. None of your men survived, not even the Asian one, so there's no one to protect your back."

I wondered how Edward told Carlisle that. They were on opposite sides of the room.

Maria nodded and turned to me. "I wouldn't have hurt you, Jasper. I don't think I am able to."

"I know that now," I said.

"You will not come near our coven, again," Esme said with steel in her voice. "Jasper may have forgiven you, but we haven't. Because of you, we'll have to leave this city." Her eyes were hard, but twinkled with triumph. Our momma bear wasn't someone to be trifled with. Emmett had good reason to fear her.

"We know what you were planning," Carlisle said. "Their thoughts betrayed you. She is willing to resort to violence, Jasper."

Maria stood stiff, defiant, but said nothing.

Emmett looked to me and I nodded. "You broke faith with us, and as the resident coven, we had a right to kill them and you."

"And you left us with a mess to clean up," added Alice.

She glanced at Alice and gave me a small smile. "I will leave you to your new life. I will clean up the... mess."

Emmett looked to each of us and we nodded in turn. "We'll leave you to it," he said to Maria. "Don't test us again. I said not to return, and I meant it. If I ever find you in one of our territories, I will personally rip you to pieces, and that's a promise." He towered over her, every inch of his massive body emanating menace.

"Not a shred of evidence can remain," Edward said from the far wall. "No one can find the bodies." He wore a slightly ill look, and I knew it was because of the carnage in the boiler room. He glanced at me and nodded imperceptibly.

"I know how to leave no trace of myself," Maria hissed. She looked offended. Then she turned to me.

"Perhaps later?" Maria asked, her eyebrows rising.

"I'll find you when I'm ready."

Maria nodded at me and then looked at the Cullens. "Until next time."

"Pray there isn't one," said Emmett with a deep growl.

Maria only glared at him, but she backed away from us and walked to the stairway. She never turned her back to us as she went down the stairs.

A fresh wave of agony gripped my throat when Maria opened the door to the furnace room.

Esme's eyes went to the door, and she looked questioningly at me.

"Her stock of food," I said. "They... couldn't be saved."

Edward's face was pressed into a tight, grim mask. "She's biting the bodies to make them flammable. She's going to burn the place to the ground."

"Let's go," said Carlisle. "We have a lot to do."

I nudged Alice, who was still immeasurably angry at either me or Maria - mostly me - but she didn't budge. Instead, her arm constricted, crushing me against her.. Right. She wasn't letting me out of her sight again.

I turned to her, ready to face her wrath. Instead, she looked up at me and kissed me long and passionately. Her lips and tongue slid passionately against mine, willing me to love her, just as her fingernails dug painfully into my back telling me she wasn't done being mad yet.

When she finally released me, we jumped to the window and followed the others outside.

Maria still breathed and infested the earth, but I didn't have another murder on my conscience. And I was finally at peace. I held Alice's hand and we jumped down from the ledges and disappeared into the night.

We ran silently through the dark streets and quiet back yards until we reached the woods near our home. The family waited for us. I pulled to a stop and braced myself for their anger, but Alice got to me first.

She leaned into me, as if to embrace me, and began yelling, pounding my chest to punctuate every word.

"Don't you ever run off on me again, Jasper Whitlock! Don't you ever leave me or make me worry like that. I couldn't see you. How dare you put us all through this kind of worry! So help me God, if you ever, ever do that again I will give you a few scars of my own, and don't you dare smirk at me!"

I bent over and silenced her with a deep kiss and powerful wave of peace. She whimpered, and hit me one last time.

"I'm sorry," I said, and looked at the others. "I shouldn't have tried this on my own."

"You nearly endangered us all, Jasper," Carlisle said, his quiet voice like ice.

"I know, sir. I'm sorry. I wanted us to be free of her and the threat I thought she presented. I wanted to be free of her. You were right, Carlisle. Killing her would have given me joy, but not peace."

"We would have backed your decision," Edward said. "We'd fight by your side."

"I know. That's why I had to go by myself. None of you needed to be hurt because of me."

"I'm glad you didn't kill her," said Esme. "I'm glad your eyes are yellow and you're still a part of us." She embraced me tightly, like a mother welcoming home her prodigal son.

"Kinda wished you'd maimed her a little, though," grumbled Emmett.

* * *

AN: Just in case you are wondering, the school building fire in Calgary really happened. According to the historical records of the Calgary Fire Department:

_On May 3, 1966, the Langevin School at First Ave. and 6A St. N.E. burned in a spectacular blaze. Calgary Fire Department Deputy Chief Denny Craig later told City officials that the three-story, 1909-era sandstone building could have been saved if he had more men._

Coincidence? I think not.


	6. Chapter 6

A huge thank you to my wonderful beta lovepath! She not only makes my writing better, she makes me **write**, and that's a very good thing.

The story and all my Twilight work here belong to the wonderful Stephenie Meyer. They always will.

For those of you who have faithfully and beautifully reviewed the story: I cannot always get to pm's and often have no way to reply to your reviews. I'm so sorry if you've reviewed my stories recently and received no reply. I am trying to work it out, but when fanfiction . net changed over the reviews to a pm system, they have been almost impossible to reply to.

* * *

**Jasper**

**September 1, 1966**

"Please tell me I _didn't_ look that depressed my first day of school," Alice said, looking down at me from her favorite resting place on my chest.

I grimaced up at her. I needed to focus today, and the imp wanted to play.

"I'm not depressed," I said. "I'm cautious. And you looked far worse." I raised my head to kiss her. She did look worse, but I didn't need to push my luck too far.

That small action also raised my hips just a bit, and she took full advantage of the small shift in position.

"Liar," she answered, wriggling just a little more.

"Dammit, Alice, that's not fair," I groaned as she pushed her body across mine. "How am I supposed to get ready for today with you doing that?"

"I'm trying to help you get excited about today, not ready," she said with a small laugh.

"I don't need to be that kind of excited right now, thank you."

"You're such a grump." She rubbed her chest over mine, letting her skin barely touch me.

My traitorous body rose and shifted under hers, and I forgot all about the school day for a blissful moment.

"Stop it or we won't be going to school at all," I growled in warning, or maybe in hope. Compared to this, school seemed nothing short of Hell. "I might just keep you hostage here all day."

"Oh, the hostage scenario. I love that one. Keep it in mind for the weekend. But for now, just relax Jazzy. It'll be fine. You're more than ready, and we'll get to be together almost all day."

"I'd rather be here all day," I said, nuzzling Alice's neck and nipping at her ear.

She looked out at the bright colors of dawn and then looked to the future. I watched her, tense and hopeful. I didn't_ need _any distractions today, but I dearly wanted this one

"All day?" she teased. "You must be slipping. Since when do you need that much time?"

I cocked an eyebrow at her. "Is that a challenge?"

"How much bliss can you cram into six minutes?" she asked, daring me with her eyes.

"How much can you handle, Mrs. Whitlock?" I was wrong; distraction is a good thing.

"Anything you can dish out. Five minutes, forty-five seconds. You're wasting time, old man."

I flipped Alice under me, my body indeed ready to meet any challenge she could dish out.

At least the day would start well.

oOo

She giggled at me. Again .

"I'm trying," I said, my teeth clenched against my rage. Why couldn't this be as easy for me as it was for Carlisle?

I passed my hand through the warm fluid and tried patting down my unruly hair.

"If you used hair spray, it would help."

"I refuse to stoop to hairspray," I reminded Alice acidly.

She came over and used her brush on my head, but the hair only stuck out worse from static electricity.

"Oh, that helps," I said, and went back after it with my comb.

She patted down the blond curl that Esme called a cowlick, but it bounced right back up. I heard her sigh and wet the hairbrush again before attacked the curl.

"Better," she announced happily.

I turned to examine myself in the mirror, and the moment my back was to Alice, she sprayed Aqua Net on me.

"Traitorous wench!" I yelled, but she'd already done the deed. I hate smelling like a woman.

"See?" she said, with a smug smile. "It didn't take much, and now there's just enough to hold the rebel curl in place all day."

I sat there, glaring at her.

"Look, I gave in on the black boots, Jazzy, but the hair simply has to calm down and obey me."

"All this for high school?" I grumbled. The first day of school was a normal thing for the rest of them, monotonous even, but I'd never been in a modern school. Unless you counted the two custodians in the small elementary school in Georgia, but that was long before we'd joined the Cullens.

"Yes. All of it for high school. You'll feel better if you fit in." She kept her eyes on the window as she looked to the future.

"Anything?' I asked. Nervous energy built up in me again.

"Yes," she said.

I tensed and watched her face.

"It'll rain all day and both you and Edward pounce on Emmett as soon as we get home." She grinned at me. "Relax, Jaz. Everything should be fine and today we can be together. I know this scares you, but you can do this, and you do."

I smiled at her and tried to feel confident, but I knew from experience how quickly that future could change. We all did. I wondered again if I would ever be truly safe among beating hearts

After evacuating Calgary six months ago and spending the summer in Alaska, we'd come here, to tiny Fredricton in New Brunswick.

The Vietnam War still raged, and we couldn't legally return to the States just yet. Fredricton not only had the perfect weather, but it was near enough to several busy ports and the relative metropolis of Quebec that we could easily catch a ship or plane for Europe should anything go wrong.

This part of Canada was beautiful with forests and rivers and the ocean nearby, but the gray sky remained a permanent feature during the last month of summer. According to the local people, it remained that way almost all year. Perfect for hiding our skin, but dismal nonetheless.

"Why Catholic?" I asked again as I pulled the light blue uniform sweater over my head.

Alice snugged up the tie and I immediately loosened it so she patted my hair down again. I rolled my eyes at her and she pecked me on the nose.

"Smaller school and older teachers, remember?" she said. "Carlisle believes that smaller schools are best the first time."

"Killing a nun is bad luck."

"For you or the nun?" She snugged my tie again.

"Alice, what if—"

"Nothing," she said with a shrug.

"You're sure? I don't want to make a mistake and ruin things again."

"Nothing happens, Jazzy. Nothing. Besides, Emmett ruined it the last time, remember?" She raised her eyebrow and pointed at the door.

Emmett knocked.

"Coming," we both said at the same time, but I didn't move.

"I honestly don't see anything Jasper, except that you look terribly nervous all day long. Oh, and you scare a scrawny kid in science, but I think he deserved it." She smiled and I grimaced.

"Tell Jasper he looks pretty and that the other kids will like him, and let's go," demanded Emmett.

I ripped opened the door, glaring at him.

"Got you out," Emmett laughed, and then with a purely evil glint in his ochre eyes, he poked my tame hair and said, "and you do look pretty."

The coward ran off and ducked behind Esme before I could catch him.

"Boys," she said as Emmett planted himself behind her. It was all the warning we needed, but our eyes continued the fight over Esme's head.

"Are we ready to go? Jasper, you look wonderful. I think you'll easily pass for a teenager," Carlisle said coming in from driving the cars up to the door. "Perhaps you could just, try and look less, well-"

"Murderous?" Emmett suggested.

"Adult," Carlisle said, shooting Emmett a warning glance.

"Can you try to look younger?" Esme asked as we walked out to the waiting cars.

"Younger?"

"Yes. More like a teen, you know, giddy and insecure," Alice explained. "A male teen uses false bravado to cover his insecurity. They swagger a lot."

"I refuse to look giddy. I don't even think I _can_ look giddy, and I'm pretty sure swaggering will terrify them," I said firmly.

"He has a point," said Edward as he joined us. "We don't need to look any creepier than we already do."

"Not that vampires at a church school could be construed as creepy," Emmett said, being his usual, helpful self. He'd already been referring to today as "Bloodfest at Gonzaga High" and had even created a theme song for it.

"I feel like the flying nun," grumbled Rosalie as she joined the family at Esme's car. She and Emmett lived a mile from the main house, giving everyone a much needed break. Though, Emmett seemed to show up every day to pester Edward and I. Even though he acted otherwise, I knew Edward enjoyed it.

"You only have to wear them for two years," Esme reminded Rosalie. "Then we'll all be off to college in New Hampshire." She eyed Rosalie's tall form and turned quickly to hide her smile. Rosalie did look like the flying nun.

The girl's hideous uniform consisted of a light blue plaid jumper and long sleeved white shirt. Our uniform, though childish, looked somewhat normal. We got to wear dark pants, a white shirt and a pale blue sweater.

"This isn't fair," Rosalie said, looking down at the uniform like she wanted to rip the offending outfit off right there. Emmett's feelings told me he'd like to do that as well.

"You make a sexy nun, Rose Baby. Can I be your priest?" Emmett asked and waggled his eyebrows. "I'd love to hear your confession." His voice became husky as he nuzzled her neck.

"I may need to do penance," she mumbled back at him. "Lots and lots of penance."

He slapped her backside playfully.

"Stop that. You two are going to be around children today. No hanky panky," Esme scolded them.

"Oversexed, creepy vampires at a Catholic school. This day should turn out well," Edward said as his face twisted with disgusted sarcasm.

I felt Alice disappear for a moment, and then Edward glared at her.

"Really?" Edward hissed. "On the first day?"

"Sorry. It hit me too fast to stop," she mumbled. "At least it wasn't the pews this time."

"Pews?" Emmett grinned at us.

"Don't you dare," warned Carlisle.

"Just, stick with the janitor's closet," Edward said, eyeing Emmett with disgust.

"Gotcha!" Emmett winked at Edward. "I _love_ having you around," he said, and gave Alice a quick hug.

Carlisle and Esme took Edward in their Cadillac and Emmett drove us in his new Pontiac. The entire way to school, he hummed the theme from "Psycho."

We got out of the cars a block from the school and walked towards the entrance. Frederickton was even cloudier than Eugene had been, and we relished the freedom of walking on the streets.

"Perhaps we should spread out," suggested Esme as we headed toward the school. "It might look less, um, creepy."

Emmett looked around at the gawking students and chuckled. "They're creepy and they're kookie, mysterious and spooky-"

Rosalie joined in, "They're altogether ooky, the Cullen family!"

"Don't even try the second verse," hissed Carlisle.

Emmett's mouth snapped shut, but he hummed the tune as we walked. He looked ridiculous in the boyish parochial garb while Rosalie looked murderous in it. Both lust and fear exploded from the teens around us.

"They love us already," I said. I braced myself for the onslaught of emotion that defined a high school.

"What's not to love," said Emmett. He winked at a cluster of younger females.

The toxic mixture of emotion coming from them nearly gagged me.

"Knock it off!" Esme had her "when I get them home..." look in her eyes.

Emmett started whistling his theme song for "Bloodfest at Gonzaga High."

Beside him, Carlisle's face fluctuated between humor and anger.

I walked rigidly, almost at attention as the emotions assailed me.

Edward looked pained as his eyes darted constantly around at the other students. His own emotions fluctuated between anger, disgust and anxiety, but maybe that was me reflection off of him.

I never really knew whose emotions I read off of Edward. I could usually tell his because they came across as haughty and a bit immature, but here, the emotions not only came from others, but bounced between us. His snobbishness was hard to detect.

Except for now.

I turned and saw Edward glaring at me, his jaw twitching.

"Sorry, but you are," I said.

"Am not."

We stopped walking to glare at each other, my mind going to all those times he'd been stuck up or prudish.

"Oh, yeah, the song fits us," said Emmett with a chuckle.

Alice let out a loud huff.

"Nothing happens," she reminded us with a stomp of her foot. "But if you two don't stop, we're going to have the school in hysterics by lunch."

Two of the girls nearby flinched back.

She pulled harder on my arm and we marched towards the entrance. "I thought Carlisle said this would be better," I whispered to Alice.

"Just breathe through your nose until you get used to the scent of them," she suggested.

"It's not the blood that's the problem; it's the hormones," I explained through gritted teeth. "These Catholic kids are worse than the public school ones."

She looked around. All human eyes were on us. The males watched Alice and Rosalie with wide eyes, and the females kept glancing at us. Lust showed plainly in their young faces.

"Not again," moaned Edward with another pained look. "I feel like a piece of meat."

"I love that feeling, man," Emmett said, grinning at two girls.

"These are the most sexually aroused teens I've ever been around," I said. If I couldn't get control of my response to their emotions, Alice and I would need the janitor's closet.

Alice missed a step beside me and then looked at me with a mischievous grin. "Really?" she asked.

"Oh, not you too," Edward whined. "And I didn't _whine_."

We walked toward the school entrance as quickly as we could. Two nuns, wearing full habits, waited for us by the front door. They managed to both smile and glower at each student as they entered.

"Oh, yes. This is perfect!" Emmett said gleefully. "Nuns greeting the vampires. It doesn't get any better than that!" He grinned at us and walked straight for the two ancient women.

Carlisle's hand caught him before he could do any damage. "Let me go first," he ordered.

"I wasn't going to do anything dangerous," Emmett mumbled, clearly disappointed.

"No, just indecent," snapped Edward.

"Have you ever seen anyone that old?" asked Rosalie.

Both nuns looked ancient with faces so full of wrinkles that making out their features proved difficult even for me.

"You know, the one on the right looks like a French nun I met in the early seventeen hundreds," Carlisle said.

"Be nice," whispered Esme.

"I'm serious," Carlisle whispered right back. "She looks_ exactly_ like her."

"How old do nuns get?" asked Edward, an incredulous look on his face.

"They age normally, why?" asked Carlisle. He looked at the nun on the right suspiciously.

"Because she thinks she recognizes you, too."

"That's impossible," said Esme. "But, be careful just in case."

"It'll be fine," Alice said yet again. The Cullen penchant for the dramatic was getting on her nerves.

Carlisle approached the nuns first, addressing the nun on the left while the one on the right stared at him. His easy demeanor and gentle smile kept the nuns' attention while we all slid past and made our way to the school's office.

The students froze and stared as we walked.

"Jasper's right. These girls are indecent," Edward said so quietly and quickly no one else could hear.

"How indecent?" Emmett asked, grinning.

"They're already fantasizing about us," Edward said with a plaintive look to heaven.

"Details. I want details," Emmett said.

"Next time we should go to an all boy's academy," I suggested.

"We tried that," smirked Rosalie. "It didn't stop the fantasies; they just, um, changed a bit."

"Oh, yeah. That was bad," agreed Emmett.

"Don't remind me," Edward moaned.

Emmett opened the door for us, and we streamed into the office. The older woman behind the desk looked terrified for a moment before Edward elbowed me.

Calm washed through the room.

"Hello. I'm Dr. Cullen, and these are my children. We came yesterday and registered, and they need their schedules and locker assignments." Carlisle's French was impeccable, and he said it so calmly and sweetly that the woman immediately blushed and smiled.

It only took a few minutes of speaking with the flustered secretary to ensure that everything had been settled. While we stood there, I looked around, growing more annoyed with every wall I saw.

As soon as we were out of the office, I whirled on Carlisle.

"_Crucifixes?_" I hissed.

"I felt they might act as a subtle reminder for you," Carlisle said easily. "The Catholic church believes in blessing each room to banish evil."

"Evil as in _vampires_?" I asked, swinging my arm toward the walls around us. "You sent us to a school where we see a crucifix at every turn?"

"Precisely. You can't get away from them here, and they'll remind you at every turn to be careful."

"Even I find that kind of sick," said Emmett. "Though it does add a nice touch to the whole horror film aspect of today."

"Here you are my dears," said Esme as we reached the locker bay. She handed us our schedules. "A short mass is always first, then class. The chapel is to the left."

"_Mass?_ You didn't mention mass," said Rosalie, glaring at the small piece of paper.

We all looked at Edward, whose face was furious.

"I knew you were hiding something," he said to Carlisle. "And this isn't funny."

Carlisle's serious face broke out in a grin. "It will help you focus your minds."

"That's why he was so terribly pleased with himself yesterday after he registered us," I muttered. The old man proved again how truly devious he could be.

"How did you miss something as big as _mass_?" Emmett snapped, glaring at Alice hard enough to panic a small boy.

"I didn't miss anything. I simply assumed we'd go to mass and that you'd all know about it. This is a Catholic school, and you can't have one without the other." She stuck her tongue out at him. "Besides, mass won't be so bad; I've done it dozens of times." She turned to me and gently rubbed my clenched hand. "Relax, Jazzy. The day will go quickly now that we're together."

I held her hand, and she looked into my eyes, and I lost myself in the wonder of Alice again.

"Remember, this is a religious school. They have strict rules that they strongly enforce, so be good," Esme said, breaking into my reverie.

She smiled proudly at me. "I knew you could do this, Jasper." She gave me a quick hug before she and Carlisle turned away.

"Oh," Carlisle said, as if he'd forgotten something. "Emmett, you and Rose are, um, creative in your tete-a-tetes, but you must use extra caution here. And you may not use the religious icons in any way that is not in conjunction with their designated purpose. Not one crucifix or candle. Do you understand?"

Emmett glared at Edward. "Narc," he growled.

"The table is called an altar, and yes, it's off limits, too," said Edward smoothly.

"I wasn't planning to use the top," Emmett said with a huff.

"Let's just say _everything_ in the chapel is off limits," Carlisle said with finality.

Beside him Esme snickered. She and Carlisle headed back out the door as the humans began making their way to their religious service.

A girl let out a soft cry when she saw Edward, and then stumbled into her giggling friends.

Giddiness slammed into me. I hate giddiness.

Edward shuddered.

"Just don't breathe," Rosalie instructed as we approached the door to the chapel. "Don't breathe and hum. It'll block the sound of their hearts."

"I need something to block their emotions, not their pulse," I snarled.

Alice grabbed my free hand and sent me as much peace and love as she could. The tension left him for a moment, and for that moment, she filled my world.

"You're with me, today," she reminded me. "You did it. You became just like me. Keep your mind on that."

"Only took twenty years," I deadpanned, but even I could hear the pride in my voice.

Her words reverberated through me. _You became just like me_. I'd thought it impossible twenty years ago.

I held Alice's hand and we walked down the long hall to the chapel. Beside us, Emmett was quoting lines from "Dracula."

So we began the school year staring down a wall of crucifixes, surrounded by hormonal teenage Catholics and suspicious nuns as we vampires headed to mass.

Being a Cullen is a strange, strange thing.

"All this place needs is Rod Serling," I mumbled as two wide-eyed teens skipped out of our way. "Vampires in church has got to be right up there in the Twilight Zone plots."

Just before we walked through the door, I felt Alice look quickly to the future. She looked up at me and smiled widely.

Then Edward snorted.

A nun glared at us and pointed at our hands. "No touching!" she warned. "Put those hands back where they belong."

"Gladly," I said under my breath, and thought of exactly where I'd like my hands to be.

"Don't you dare," Edward said. "Bad luck, remember?"

x~X~x

**September 23rd**

"What is wrong with them," I asked Edward as we finished gym class. The males around us seemed morose, almost as if they dreaded something, and the girls in the hall radiated anxiety and pent up rage.

Edward stopped for a moment and listened.

"Which ones?" he asked. "There seems to be quite a bit wrong with all of them, or at least they think so."

"There's something going on with many of the females. I can't put my finger on it, but I can feel it, and it's getting worse." I realized the boys around us were stalling. They usually rushed to prepare to meet the girls in the hall. "The mating urge is waning in the males," I noted.

A wave of anguish flowed through the walls, and a female cried out in pain. I felt fear as well, seeming to come from several sources at once.

"Five boys are nearby," said Edward.

"You hate me! You never really loved me, did you? How could you even think of taking me to a hockey game on our two month anniversary?" The girl's voice sounded hysterical.

"Utterly out of control," said Edward.

Faintly now, we heard the desperate pleas of a young man. "But you said you love hockey," he said.

Edward's face looked confused and then he dropped his head.

"Hell Week," he said softly.

"Is that some type of tradition here?" I asked.

"What?" asked Emmett. He'd been asked by the coach to stay behind and put up the volleyball nets.

"If Jasper's right, the first of many Hell Weeks is coming," Edward explained.

"Already? That usually takes a few months," said Emmett. He quickly changed into his school uniform, unusually deep in thought as he switched shirts.

We didn't really need to worry about anyone seeing us, because none of the others would dare change clothes near us.

"I'm not looking forward to dealing with Rosalie. Do you think we can convince Carlisle to let us be sick?" he asked.

"_What_ is Hell Week?" I snapped.

Emmett looked around and leaned over. "It's what it sounds like. The long name for it is Hormonal Hell Week."

"What you're feeling from the females is the shift in their hormones as their bodies prepare for menstruation," Edward explained.

A feeling of awkward embarrassment came over me, which was rather stupid since fertility no longer mattered to us.

"Oh, it matters, more than you can possibly tell," Edward said. "Besides, it's natural to feel a bit awkward."

"What?" asked Emmett.

"He's a little embarrassed," Edward explained, much to my horror.

Emmett grinned at me.

"Hell Week matters a great deal," Edward continued. "Every female around us reacts to the fertility cycles of the others."

"It's like Mother Nature conspired against us," Emmett said.

"For some unknown reason, they all begin to coordinate with each other, and their menstrual cycles begin to overlap. There's no scientific reason for it, but Carlisle confirms that it's real," Edward said. He looked back over his shoulder. Two young men were whispering together. "Even they know about it."

Emmett and I looked at the students. They both looked up at us suspiciously.

"Les femmes," Edward said with a shrug.

"Oui," nodded the taller boy, and they went back to their conversation.

"How does it affect vampires? You said you didn't want to be around Rosalie, but she has no cycles." I looked at my brother's faces. They just stared at me.

"Wait, once a month?" I asked.

"Yes, for three to five days or so," Emmett said, nodding.

"But, it's impossible," I said, even though I knew they were right. "Wait. Rosalie's bad dress days?"

"And Alice's guilt days, too," said Edward. "I know it's impossible, but so long as Alice and Rosalie are around human females, they're slightly affected by their mood swings."

"It makes no logical sense," I said, shaking my head.

"Nope, never does," said Emmett. "We'll need to get Jazz out of the building the first few times, just to make sure." He looked at Edward meaningfully.

"What?" I asked.

"Mood swings aren't the only bad part of Hell Week," Emmett said.

The bell rang, and we walked into the hallway. The air crackled with tension and something else. Hunger. The wastebaskets in the hallway overflowed with wrappers.

"This is unbearable," I hissed as a girl burst out in tears and ran into the restroom for no apparent reason. "How can it possibly get worse?"

Emmett and Edward both stopped and looked at me.

"How much experience with human females did you have before you were changed?" Edward asked.

"Enough," I lied.

"Do you remember much about your mother's cycles?" Edward asked quietly.

Emmett looked away, and I sensed discomfort coming from him. I don't think I'd ever felt that from Emmett before.

I searched my memory for what he could possibly be talking about. I froze in my tracks when my perfect memory finally found the information.

"Dear God!"

"Yeah," said Edward with a nod.

"How do you keep from killing them all?"

"It doesn't affect us like fresh blood, but it does increase venom production. Just to be sure nothing happens, you'll need to be sick once a month."

"I already am," I said.

"You done?" asked Emmett nodding to the cafeteria doors. The girls waited there for us.

Before, we could reach them, Emmett turned to me and began whispering fervently. "Oh, and no matter what Alice asks or says, she's beautiful, it looks great on her, and you want to do whatever she wants to do. Got it?"

I nodded and braced myself against the onslaught of anxiety coming from the cafeteria. How on earth did the human race survive this?

**Alice**

**September 25****th****, two days later**

"Ignore them," Rosalie said. "They aren't important; Jasper is. Keep your focus on him."

"I know," I said into my gym locker. But I could hear them, and for some strange reason, their immature words still stung. I focused on seeing Jasper—we'd be together in just two minutes—and blocked out the voices. The words still came through, though.

"...such a freak. And Rosalie is a snob."

"...bitches, both of them. It's bizarre the way Alice is always staring and smiling. I think she's crazy. And her boyfriend? What's up with those looks he gives us? It's like he hates us, or something. They aren't even Catholic, why go here?"

I looked to the weekend, and our trip to the Hudson Bay area. We'd find brown bear, big ones, plump and ready for winter. Emmett, his shirt torn to shreds from the battle, waltzed with the carcass of one.

"She's doing it again, the freak."

My chest clenched for just a moment. I loved my family, every one of them, but I couldn't help but remember the humans in my life—the ones who'd reached out to me despite my oddity. I stupidly still longed for another such friend.

"...like her shouldn't be allowed out of mental institutions. What if she goes all psycho on us? Oh, and my brother says the reason the red head won't look at girls is because he only likes other boys. He looks at them in the shower." Several girls gasped.

"I bet they're all perverts. I bet the house is nothing but a pit of debauchery."

Rosalie and I both glanced at the tall girl who said it. She immediately reddened.

"Oh yeah," Rosalie said, giving the girls a wink and a smile. "You should try it."

Their mouths dropped in unison.

"Rose." I glared at her.

"Hey, we're only here for two years, why not play on the whole sex thing. It'll be fun for Edward."

"Sure, he'll love that."

"He's such a prude. It makes him fun to play with." Rosalie grinned at me as she pulled on her jumper. Then she caught an image of herself and glared at it. "Does this uniform make me look fat?"

"Nothing makes you look fat, Rose. Besides, you have nothing to complain about. The jumper swallows me and makes me look even shorter," I said. I understood Rosalie's constant need to be lovely, but sometimes it got on my nerves.

"It looks cute on you. You have that little-girl figure that matches the cut. The uniform just makes my hips look big," she complained.

"I do not have a little girl's figure," I snapped.

She just raised an eyebrow at me.

"Well, maybe I'm small, but at least I know what fashions _do_ look good on me," I said. I knew I was pushing a fight, but right now I didn't care. "So I know for a fact that this one looks worse on me than yours does on you."

"Let's have the boys settle this," said Rosalie. "We can ask them who looks worse, me or you." She whirled on her heel to leave, and I stuck my tongue out at her.

We marched down the hall and as we did, I saw a vision of the boys running from the school. Weird.


	7. Chapter 7

**__**Once again, my super beta Lovepath came through for all of you. She's amazing and very talented at pushing me along. I hope you all enjoy it.

Twilight and all it's characters belong to Stephenie Meyer. I wish she'd act like she wanted to keep them.

* * *

_**September, 1968**_

_**Alice**_

_**Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH**_

"You ready for this?" Emmett asked, nearly shaking with excitement.

The crowd around us cheered, and Emmett's head snapped back to the field.

"Relax," I warned him. A vision of a man grabbing his back side and screaming in pain flashed through my mind. "Yes, we're ready. But, Emmett, if you don't calm down, you're going to pinch some poor man's butt right off."

"Really?" Emmett turned and looked to Edward.

"She's serious," Edward said. "You rip a chunk. It's not pretty."

"Sicko," Rosalie teased.

"Remember, wait until the ball is in play, move fast and only touch a few." Everyone nodded at me. "And for God's sake, don't get caught. Carlisle will kill us if he ever finds out what we've done. Now, spread out and follow my lead."

I looked at the faces of my siblings and grinned. After two tense years at Gonzaga Prep School, I felt like I'd been set free. Jazzy had only two close calls during our time there, but the constant stress of keeping my mind's eye on him wore me out. Not to mention what it did to him.

College promised to be much more fun.

I walked nonchalantly to the edge of the bleachers and waited for the right moment. A fumble gave me the perfect opportunity, and I darted between the metal supports, moving as quickly as I could. I targeted anything that hung over the edges of the planks—ankles, legs, butts—and shoved, grabbed, or tickled whatever I could reach.

When I reached the other side of the bleachers, I raced back to the others. It took only eight seconds to create utter mayhem in the stands.

One young woman was yelling at two astonished looking young men. A skittish looking older man stood on his tiptoes as he went higher on the bleachers. Another man in a suit plucked ice out of his soaking wet blazer while two others looked warily around and dusted popcorn off themselves. At the far end, two women began shoving each other.

"That was _awesome_!" Emmett gushed. "Your looks are deceptive, Alice. You're cute, but amazingly evil."

"Tell me about it," said Jazzy beside me, but he looked almost as excited as Emmett.

"I'm taking the band section," said Rosalie as she headed over to the opposing team's bleachers.

Emmett trotted after her, calling dibs on several white haired women in fur coats.

"You wanna babysit or shall I?" Edward asked, watching the two of them like a father watches a naughty child. He didn't look excited, but at least he didn't look bored.

"I can go. I've already had my fun. You two enjoy the contest," I said, smiling at their confused faces.

"We have a contest?" Jazzy asked, looking at Edward.

Edward shrugged and focused on the scenes running through my mind.

"We try to see who starts the most fights between people in the stands."

"Brilliant," said Jazzy. "I'm glad one of us was going to think that up."

I saw that they'd soon be arguing numbers and laughing like little boys. Before I reached the other bleachers, someone shrieked, and a pair of drum sticks flew into the crowd.

I loved college life.

x~X~x

"Man, I love college life!" Emmett said serenely as we walked across the dark campus. "The flipping toupee killed me, Ed. How did you think of it?"

"Technically, he thought of it. He couldn't stop worrying about the wind, so I blew on it just a bit," Edward said with a chuckle. "It flapped like a bird's wing, and he didn't even realize it until those kids started laughing at him."

"I think I can get used to a place like this," nodded Jazzy. He walked with his arm draped across me, his gait lazy and relaxed. Losing to Edward hadn't even bothered him.

"College is so much better than high school," I agreed. It felt wonderful to be with adults, or almost adults, again. Especially here.

Dartmouth's stately white buildings glowed under the moonlight, and night rested peacefully on the campus. The campus looked picturesque in the soft blue of starlight.

Except for the football field.

There, several groups of fans still fought with each other over inappropriate touching while others rushed to their waiting cars, more than ready to get away from such a creepy place.

"They're going to be at it for hours," I said with a feeling of satisfaction.

"You did very well causing mayhem. I'm proud of you, you little imp," Edward said to me with a small smile.

"You had fun, didn't you?" I prodded. "Admit it, I was right." _And I had to drag you here, you fuddy-duddy. You really need to listen to me more often._

"I had fun," he said. "But that's all I'll admit to."

"Carlisle will have our heads if he ever finds out," said Rosalie with a chuckle. "When those tuba players jumped up and knocked all those clarinet players over, I thought I'd lose it."

"And the lady with the false teeth," snorted Emmett. "Did you see how far she spit those puppies? Sometimes, I love being a vampire."

"You're about to love it even more," Edward said, smiling at Emmett. I hadn't seen that smile in so long, I'd forgotten how happy he could look. "Follow me."

Edward ran silently toward the woods near the river to the west of campus. There, lying among the trees, several college students lay passed out in a circle of trees. The air reeked of burnt weed and empty beer cans littered the ground where they lay.

"You thinkin' what I'm thinkin', little bro?" asked Emmett.

"Unfortunately, I'm always thinking what you're thinking. I can't get away from it," Edward said with a wry twist to his mouth. "But, yes, in this case I think we can have some fun. It should _not_, however, involve the flag pole."

"Spoilsport."

"Care to let the rest of us in on this?" Rosalie looked from Emmett to Edward and placed her hands on her hips.

"We want to teach them a lesson and have some fun," explained Edward. "He's thinking of posing them in various compromising positions around campus. And that's disgusting," he snapped at Emmett. "What is it with you and long poles?"

Rosalie grinned and snorted while Emmett looked hard at Edward.

Edward looked stricken and rubbed his hands over his face and then through his hair as if he was trying wash away the memory.

"You have no idea how I badly I wish I could," he said to me.

"You're the one who mentioned poles," Jazzy said. "There are just some things you shouldn't mention around Emmett. Like foot size."

"Keep those on," Edward warned Emmett, who was already untying his shoe.

"So, you want to put them in the girl's dormitory?" asked Rose, who tried to ignore Emmett's attempt to compare shoe size with Edward.

"Boooring," sang Emmett. "And cliché. I'm going for artistic here. Alice, do you know if there are tutus in the fashion department?"

"He wants to pose them on the front green by the admission building," said Edward motioning to the still bodies. A smile tugged at his lips.

"Brilliant," said Jazzy, nodding in appreciation.

"That'll work," I said with a smile. The image of eight stoned young men sprawled across the grass in front of the administrative offices came to me. It was indeed an artistic scene. "The drama department may have some." I looked to the future and saw that Rosalie and I would jump out of the attic window with our arms full of tulle.

"This night just keeps getting better." Emmett actually clapped his hands in excitement.

"Easy big boy," said Rosalie. "Alice and I will get the props. You strip them."

Images of the next few minutes filled my mind. I giggled at what was about to happen.

"Oh, this is going to be good. Trust me." I looked over at Edward who laughed out loud. "Let's hurry," I said to Rosalie, and we took off toward the theater complex.

It took only a few moments to break in and find what we needed. Rosalie even found some tiaras.

"Mom?" a shaky voice said as we returned.

"It's okay, sweetie. Mommy's here," Emmett said in a falsetto, motherly tone. "Let me help you get ready for bed."

"I'm a little sick," the young man said incredibly slowly. "I think I might be stoned."

"Mommy can help," Emmett cooed, pulling the boy's shirt over his head and shaking with his attempt to hold back his laughter.

"Becky? Why are you here?" slurred another one who looked up at Jazzy with crossed eyes. "I've missed you, honey. You sure look pretty in the moonlight."

Jazzy began laughing too hard to strip him, so Rosalie went over to the barely conscious man.

"Let me help you get to bed," she said sweetly. She pulled off his shoes as he ogled at her.

"Oh, man!" he cried after she pulled off his pants. "I've died, haven't I? You're an angel, aren't you?"

"Oh, yes, I'm an angel," she confirmed with a grin.

"Why are you taking my clothes off if I'm dead?" he asked. His eyes rolled back as his head lolled to the side.

"To fit your wings," Rosalie whispered.

The young man nodded once and began to snore.

It took four minutes to change them once Jazzy and Emmett finally stopped laughing. Edward and I guided them as we snuck the limp bodies to the grass in front of the McNutt building.

"You realize Esme and Carlisle are going to know who did this, right?" asked Edward as he positioned a tiara on a long-haired male. "That's just mean," he added, grinning at Rosalie.

"Yes, yes it is." She pulled out her lipstick and smiled back.

"What's the worst Carlisle can do to us?" asked Emmett. "I mean, I know we're gonna get a talk, but really, what can they do?"

"Move," said Jazzy. "And take your money with them." He knew how much Emmett and Rosalie liked their toys.

"Oh, yeah. I hadn't thought about that."

"Don't be a baby." Rosalie dropped the head of the boy she'd been working on and grabbed another. "Help me pucker his lips," she said to Emmett.

"You're joking, right? I don't pucker boys' lips."

Rosalie glared and growled, and Emmett's fingers pinched the long-haired male's lips out like a duck.

"It's a thing of pure beauty," said Jazzy as we all finished.

"And they won't wake up until long after they've been found and photographed," I said cheerfully. "By the way, Esme giggles the whole time Carlisle lectures us, so it won't be too bad."

"It's so very worth it," said Emmett with a satisfied nod. "Yeah, I think I'm gonna love college life."

_**Jasper**_

_**November 26, 1968**_

"Fools!" I yelled as I pulled my foot back and struck the midsection of the man. His broken corpse flew through the air and wrapped itself around a tree before landing in a tangled mass of limbs on the ground.

The last moments of emotion—fear, rage, dismay, grief- dissipated from my mind, but the damage I'd done would linger much longer.

Failure. Murder.

If only I'd kept my senses for a moment longer. If only the wind hadn't shifted.

If only I wasn't controlled by a monster.

"I'm sorry, Jazzy."

My body tensed in shame. Of all that I hated about my weakness, hurting Alice was the worst.

"Never be sorry," I said.

Regret rushed from her, mingling with my own. Regret feels like decaying corpses smell.

"It's not your fault, Alice," I said, much softer. I couldn't turn to face her yet. There's a look she gets when my eyes are crimson that I hate more than anything in the world. She never looks at me like it's my fault, but rather like she's done something wrong. I hate that.

"Please don't apologize for my mistakes. I did this, and it isn't your fault. It's not your responsibility to stop me, Beloved. It's mine."

I looked over at her as she stood by their tent. She chewed on her bottom lip and stared at the two broken bodies.

"Will their people find them?" I asked.

"Their families," she said, and finally looked at me. The moment she looked into my eyes, guilt rushed through her and knitted her eyebrows together. The hole where my heart once beat burned, and I looked away.

"Go tell the others. I'll clean up here and find you."

"Jazzy, I-"

"Alice, please. I'll make it look like a bear attack. The one I chased left his prints here. I'll make it look believable. How long?"

"They won't be found for several days, I believe."

"That's good. By the time they're found, the weather will make it look like an animal attack."

Her lips pursed and for a moment as her emotions warred within her, but she finally acquiesced.

"When you find us, we'll be by the campsite," she said as she turned to leave. She wavered at the edge of the tiny clearing. I know she wanted to comfort me, but I didn't want or deserve comfort right now.

"I know you want to stay, but this is something I need to do alone."

She looked up at me, her face full of sorrow. "I know."

"Thank you." I didn't want her to go, but I couldn't let her stay. The guilt of what I'd done and what I had to do didn't need to touch us both.

She nodded and ran off.

I took a deep breath, smelling the intoxicating scent of human blood as it lingered in the air. Even cold and drying, it made my muscles tense and venom rush into my mouth. The monster called for more, never satisfied, no matter how much it fed.

I thought I was stronger than this.

I looked up at the cold, November night sky and breathed in deeply, letting the burn sizzle in my throat. Pain felt good at the moment.

I chose to work on the younger man, boy really, first. They'd come from one of the local native communities, here to hunt for the winter's supply of meat.

If only I hadn't followed the bear's scent. If only I hadn't run too far from Alice during the chase. If only I didn't thirst every second of every day for what I no longer wanted.

The boy lay where I'd caught him. No animal would touch him with my venom in his flesh, so I'd have to rip his body apart myself. Something besides venom made my mouth taste bitter despite the blood still lingering on my tongue.

"Forgive me, child," I said to the wind. I couldn't unclench my fingers for a moment. I had to do this, though. I forced my fingers open and, using my fingernails, began mutilating his face like the claws of a bear might. I continued down the body, until his clothing hung in tatters across his pallid skin.

My stomach clenched as I stepped away from the shredded corpse and headed to the older man. They didn't deserve this. They deserved to be buried among their people.

Hell, they deserved to return home, carrying food for their family.

None of that mattered now. The only thing that mattered was hiding my weakness, hiding what my monster had done. I raised my hand and shredded the older man's face.

Before I left, I ripped the tent in two.

x~X~x

"What about classes?" asked Rosalie. "Is he safe? Can we trust him?"

"Can you trust _me?_" Emmett asked, his voice unusually quiet. "It's a mistake, Rosie. We make those."

"I won't have him ruin this for us. We haven't been in college for years, and this school is perfect for us," she protested.

"We don't need to leave school, Rosalie. We just need to hide Jasper's eyes," Emmett said.

"We shouldn't _have_ to do anything," Rosalie snapped.

"Rosalie," Edward warned. He knew I could hear them.

_She's right. Let her speak. _I didn't need Edward's pity now.

"I just didn't see it in time," Alice said. "If I'd seen it soon enough, nothing would have happened. The humans came out of their tent just as the bear passed them. They were right in his path."

A heavy silence fell on the group, and I walked slowly into the midst of my family. I couldn't bring myself to run all the way here. Not after what I'd done.

"Jasper, can you tell us what happened?" Carlisle asked. As always, his voice remained calm and comforting.

"Alice and I followed a moose herd to the river. I caught the scent of a bear and separated from Alice to track it." I didn't mention I'd also assumed Alice would keep me safe, or that I depended on her visions rather than my self-restraint. "It ran off faster than I thought it could and led me through a hunting camp. They came out of the tent just as the bear passed it. I smelled their blood and attacked the older one."

"He took care of it," said Edward evenly. Only the roughness of his voice gave away his turmoil at what he'd seen in my head.

"No one will know what happened here," I agreed. "I made it look like an animal attack."

"I trust that you did," Carlisle said. "We'll need to pack up and leave this place." Only a twitch in his jaw betrayed the grief he felt.

"It's a mistake, Jazz. We all make 'em. Well, most of us do," Emmett said, glancing at his mate. "No one blames you."

"I know," I said heavily. "I know, Emmett, but this _mistake_ had names and lives and families." That might be the worst part. In my past life, mistakes were expected. Punished, but expected. Humans existed to feed us. We took what we needed from their dead bodies and called it fair. But the two humans I killed tonight were no longer food to me and had a right to be alive.

"You're right, Carlisle," Edward said. He'd been disgusted when I first walked into camp, but now an emotion akin to respect came from him. "He has changed."

"I just killed two humans. That's not much of a change," I snapped.

Alice was at my side instantly, her hands covering my blood stained ones. I resisted pulling away, and my hand wrapped automatically around hers.

I finally looked into her face. "I truly am sorry," I whispered. "For all of us."

"I know," she whispered back.

"You're different," Edward continued. "You used to feel badly for your victims, but you never saw them as creatures equally deserving of life."

"It's a small change, but an important one, Jasper." Carlisle walked over and placed his hand on my shoulder. "It means that you aren't a killer any longer. Once you see humans as worthy of the life they've been given and not just beings whom you'd prefer not to destroy, you stop being a predator."

"Pity I still look like one." I looked Carlisle straight in the eye, crimson to gold.

"We'll return and hunt in New Brunswick. Perhaps your eyes might be orange by the time classes resume."

"Orange is only slightly better than red, Carlisle," Rosalie said, "and he can't go to classes in November with sunglasses on."

"Regardless, Jasper needs to hunt." One look from Carlisle kept Rosalie from saying anything else. "It was an accident," he reminded her.

"It will only take about ten days for your eyes to change back. That's only a week of classes, Jazzy." Alice sent love pulsing through me as she spoke. Like always, she accepted me, no matter what I'd done.

"There's no use in arguing or complaining. What's done is done. Let's break camp and leave," said Esme. "There's no reason to stay in this dismal place any longer."

"It isn't even Thanksgiving yet," protested Emmett. "Can't we go somewhere else?"

"What about the north side of Lake Winnipeg?" suggested Edward. "It's only a few hours away, and I could use a good run."

"Alice?" Carlisle's voice was nearly lost in the wind.

"I don't see anything more than animals," she said, but she looked uncertainly at him. "I didn't see anything more than animals this time, either."

"You don't need to be perfect, Alice. No one expects it, and you mustn't demand it of yourself," Carlisle said gently. He put his hand under her chin and smiled at her.

"It'll be alright," Esme said. "We can leave this place behind and Jasper can hunt again."

I nodded at her. It was what we always did. Destroy something good, leave, and try again. An endless cycle of death.

"It still won't help his eyes," muttered Rosalie as she began gathering the few items she'd brought for the hunting trip.

"I wish there was a way to paint corneal lenses," said Esme. "If we could somehow keep the paint on the glass, then accidents wouldn't mean isolation for us."

"Venom destroys every paint you've tried," Carlisle reminded her.

"Still, there should be a way." Esme began gathering her things, shoving them quickly into a backpack.

"You know, there's a fascinating new polymer lens that I've read about. It's made of plastics rather than glass, and though it won't withstand venom for long, I think there might be a way to insert the pigment between the layers of polymer so that the eye color remains as long as the lens does," said Emmett. He hefted his backpack and looked around. "What?"

"Since when do you worry about polymers and plastics?" asked Edward.

"Since I became a chemistry major at Dartmouth," answered Emmett.

"I thought you did that to be near Rosalie," said Alice.

"Nope. I like chemistry. Rosalie majored in physics to be near me," Emmett said with a grin.

"I happen to enjoy physics, thank you very much," snapped Rosalie.

"That might be an excellent field to invest our money in," nodded Alice. "Perhaps we can even create a research and development company for tinted contact lenses." She and Emmett began discussing the concept of tinted lenses while I made my way over to Carlisle.

"They were providing food for their families," I said to him. I knew I didn't need to say anything more.

"We'll make sure the local villages are provided for during the winter," he said.

"I need to do it," I said. "I want to be the one to bring the meat in."

Carlisle opened his mouth to say something but thought better of it. "Take Edward with you," he began, and then held up his hands when I began to protest. "Just so you know what they're thinking. Native people often have longer memories and see the world more clearly than modern society."

I nodded and looked at Edward. As much as I hated it, Carlisle was right, and I'd need him.

"It's what family does," Edward said quietly. He pulled on his backpack. "It's what we always do."

I longed for the day when I'd be needed like that.

_**December 24, 1968**_

"You've never done this?" asked Esme.

"When I was a human I'm sure I went a lot," I said. "My grandfather was a preacher, so I'm pretty sure I went more than I wanted to, I just don't remember any of them."

"I've tried to go every year once I learned to handle my thirst," said Carlisle. "Like you, as a child I couldn't escape church, but as a Puritan, we never celebrated Christmas. Our feast happened on the winter solstice."

"What made you go to a Christmas service if you weren't raised with them?" I asked. Alice pulled closer to me as we walked, a candle in her hand and a peaceful smile on her face.

Christmases as a Cullen were festive events, full of games, hunting, and gifts. I relished the holiday, but I'd never gone with them to church. Churches and I didn't get along.

Around us, people walked toward the old Anglican church with similar candles and smiles. I'd never been around people like these. They were excited and happy to walk in the snowfall.

"I wanted to know what could be so wrong with celebrating the birth of Christ," Carlisle said. "I'd been raised that Catholics were damned, and I'd never truly questioned it. I'd also been raised that vampires were evil demons, and since I didn't quite fit that mold, I walked into a Catholic church in Scotland for Christ's mass there."

"What was it like?" asked Emmett.

"Strange." Carlisle laughed. "We didn't have robes or choirs or gilded decoration when I grew up. That small Catholic chapel was far more ornate than anything I'd ever seen. I could understand why my plain-minded kinfolk looked down on it. But as I watched, I noticed that the worshipers surrounding me were just as reverent and Christian as any I'd seen in my father's church." He looked up at the white spire of the church we headed to and stopped.

"That night changed me. It wasn't a religious awakening of any kind, but for the first time in five years, I felt a part of humanity again, if only for a little while. The service reminded me of the most basic tenet of faith I'd been taught, that redemption is available for all who seek it. I've tried to attend a Christmas service ever since."

"I remember many Christmases and I know I went to midnight services, though I can't remember a single one," Edward said. "I don't think I forgot the sermons because I'm sure I slept through them all."

"You and me both," chuckled Emmett. ``All I remember from church is my granny pinching my ears. A lot."

"I would say that, like Carlisle, my favorite Christmas is the one when I finally understood the concept of redemption." Edward didn't mention the year. He never spoke of the time he drank from humans unless forced to. Even now, guilt cut through him, sharp as a knife.

As if she somehow knew what he felt, Esme looked up and smiled at him. "That one was my favorite as well," she said quietly.

"What did you think of your first Christmas, Alice?" asked Rosalie. Her voice sounded cautious and her face remained blank.

To me, she projected tension and underlying rage. I knew why, of course. Christmas remained a human event, no matter how much we tried to celebrate it at the Cullen home. She'd told me one year that the hardest part was not being able to sleep. Waiting for Santa while tucked in her bed, fighting sleep until it forced her eyes closed, and then waking to presents remained one of her most cherished, and few, good memories from her human life.

Now even the small comfort of sleep disappeared like the rest of her human life. Almost as if becoming immortal destroyed all the magic she knew.

"It seemed bizarre to me," replied Alice. "I'd seen Christmas before, of course, but I didn't understand what the humans were doing until I lived in the attic of that church. I watched them all come into the church of course, but didn't understand what they were doing. Then they rang that huge bell. Truly, the bell terrified me the first time they rang it. I was sure I'd been found and I'd lost my home. But then they started to sing. The whole congregation, not just the choir. It mesmerized me, and for the first time, I came down from the attic to join the people in the church service. They all wore such festive clothing, and each one held a candle, and they sang. I joined in, and for a moment, I felt like I could almost have once been human. Almost."

Something in her voice and in the complex array of emotions coming from Alice tugged at my silent heart, and I leaned over to kiss her head. She looked at me with such adoration that I forgot to take a breath.

"But the best Christmas was the first one I spent with Jasper. We sat at the top of the Devil's Tower in Wyoming under a massive and endless field of stars. He gave me a hand carved jewelry box, and I felt that no one on earth had ever been given such a great gift."

"That's the one on your dresser, isn't it?" asked Esme.

Alice looked away from me, almost startled to see others around us. "Yes, but that's not what I meant." She pulled me into a deep kiss, radiating a deep joy. "When you have nothing and no one, finding love is the greatest gift."

Carlisle said nothing, but I felt him explode with strong emotions I could only barely name. As I watched, his eyes went first to his wife and then to each of his children and finally to us. "Yes, it is," he said quietly.

We walked through the tall doors of the church in silence, each one of my family thinking of times past. I held on to Alice and held my breath and wondered at the idea of redemption for those who had no souls.

"Oh, aren't they adorable?" exclaimed Esme as the service began.

I don't know what I expected, but children in makeshift costumes certainly wasn't it. Amid the greenery and tinsel in the old, stately building, an ill-constructed manger sat where the pulpit should have been. Above it, a lopsided paper star swung in the thick air. Nervous looking children shuffled onto the stage, each one looking around for guidance or escape.

"Interesting," I mumbled.

"They have the Christmas pageant first," whispered Alice. "The service starts right afterward."

The children gathered in a fidgeting group, shepherded by a harried looking woman, and stood looking at the crowd. An angel twisted her halo in her hands, a sheep chewed on his hoof, and what was supposed to be a cow kept shoving a wise man off the stage.

I leaned over to Carlisle. "What is the religious meaning of this?"

"The tradition of reenacting the birth of Christ began with Saint Francis of Assisi in the thirteen hundreds," he explained, his mouth twitching into a smile. "Children's reenactment is much more modern. It's meant to help the congregation focus on the real meaning of Christmas. But, really, it is more of a photo opportunity for their parents."

He indicated a row of human males all stationed on the first pew with cameras in hand.

"No, Brady, don't pick your nose," hissed a woman behind us. A shepherd's hand instantly fell to his side.

Esme giggled. She looked mesmerized by the scene in front of us. Longing mingled with adoration, and I knew she was remembering her human life and the child she lost.

On the other side of me, Rosalie smiled as she watched the children, her emotions mimicking Esme's, but loss and bitterness tainted the mix. A mother to our right lifted a sleeping infant to her shoulder, and pain sliced through Rosalie. Her face fell, and had she been human, she would have begun to sob. Instead, she reached into her purse and pulled out a small compact. Holding the mirror low, she glanced at her reflection until the pain ebbed.

I felt Edward's disgust at her actions and wondered if we'd ever see Rosalie quite the same way.

The children began to sing, each one barely letting out any sound, except for the off-key boy in the back.

Rosalie glanced back up and watched the children, her smile stiff but there.

"Look deeper, Jasper. Or feel deeper, perhaps," Carlisle whispered.

I nodded and tried to drown out the sound of old pianos and anxious children. I tried not to hear a hundred hearts beating near me.

I felt Edward's interest pique. _Look, I'm trying here. I just don't get it._

Edward chuckled and nodded to an old couple in the far corner of the building.

They held each other, arms wrapped around each other as if they needed to hold each other up. From them came a deep love. It focused on each other, and on the children at the front of the room, and on the star that swung in the air. Joy followed the love, and wonder as well.

All around me, the humans emitted similar emotions. There was anxiety from worried mothers, pride from adoring fathers, and fear from hot children, but over all the tangled emotions, those three took precedence.

"...in the dark street shineth the everlasting light.…." The children pointed to the twisting star and two angels lost their halos to the flinging hands. The crowd chuckled and the children grinned. They swayed and sang, pointing to the paper fluttering above them.

Another night came to my mind.

"Feliz Navidad, Senor," said a year old male. I'd found him on the roof of Maria's warehouse in Monterrey. I'd sent the older ones there to guard her goods.

"You sure?" I asked, mentally ticking off the days in my head. Just then, the bells began ringing.

"Si, Senor," the male said with a laugh. Then he looked up at the night sky and pointed at the brightest star. "It's like in the story, no? Tonight they'll go to church and eat tamales and cake." His emotions turned sorrowful as grief at his recently lost life took hold of him.

I looked at the night sky and tried to remember what was so important about this night that looked like all the others, and when nothing came, I reached over and ripped the head from my nameless soldier. Within seconds, he burned in thick chunks under that starry field.

Nothing but lights. Nothing special enough to stop the inevitable cycle of death.

"The children will sing throughout the play," said Carlisle.

His voice called me back from the memory of sickeningly sweet smoke. Only three children remained on the stage. The girl had a pillow on her stomach that she held in place with her hands.

Anxious unrest came from Edward, who'd seen everything in my memory.

_Sorry. I shouldn't have done that to you. It's one of my Christmas memories. Probably why I don't reminisce about the holiday._

"I can understand that," Edward said with a grimace.

"Oh little town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie..." Small voices called my attention back to the front. The children crowded together again, singing louder this time.

I focused on their faces and the feelings around me, trying to keep myself locked in the present.

I watched as Mary's pillow miraculously became a doll, which she dropped twice as she tried to place it in the manger. I listened as the entire crowd sang "Hark the Herald Angels" with the six squirming children holding lopsided halos.

And I tried not to think about Christmases past. About a battle waged against a desperate coven. About burning bodies and black nights. About a young man running home with a red-bowed box who crossed my path. He never arrived home, and I will forever wonder what little girl never received the shattered doll within the box.

Alice pressed a note into my hand. It read _Fruitcake_ in Edward's strong script. She giggled as she passed it to me.

Images of our first Christmas with the Cullens replaced the dark memories that threatened to overtake me.

Esme spent every Christmas baking for others. The kitchen in the home, unused the rest of the year, became a virtual factory as the family produced pounds of festive food for charities. The scent of spices, though unappetizing, remained pleasant to us, so we all readily participated most years.

However, our first year with the Cullens, Esme made eight-dozen fruitcakes to give to the poor. Even humans can't stand those things, and their all but intollerable to our enhanced senses. To keep ourselves from smelling the nauseus batter, we chopped and tossed at full, vampire speed with disastrous results. The disgusting candies flew through the air like rain and soon a sticky food fight erupted. It took us well into the spring to find all the tiny bits.

Or the year we went to Russia with the Denali clan and played hide and seek with the soldiers at a Soviet outpost. Not a traditional Christmas, but tremendously festive, nevertheless.

Beside me, Edward snorted and then focused on the dancing farm animals.

I looked up and saw shepherds and wise men join the sweating animals. The sheep, covered in itchy pompoms, scratched themselves as they sang "We Three Kings." Every face in the audience smiled as they enjoyed the program. They smiled at the imperfection.

And then I understood why vampires would come to a church service.

Redemption is for the imperfect.


	8. Chapter 8

_**A huge thank you to two wonderful women who help me even when I don't deserve it. Thank you Abbyweyr and SmittenbyTwilight!**_

* * *

_** June, 1972 Hanover, NH**_

_**Jasper**_

"_Frills?"_

"Too much?" Alice asked. She smoothed out the massive collar on the dress shirt from hell and stepped back to look at me. "I think it works, Jazzy."

"There are frills down the front of my shirt! What do frills work _with_, exactly?"

"Those are _ruffles_, Jaz, not frills. Besides, ruffles are in fashion now, just like when you were human," she said smiling at me.

"They weren't a good idea then, either," I countered. I tugged on the tight cuff, trying to make the shirt look better. It didn't work. "There's a reason it took a hundred years for them to come back into style."

"Stop shifting around," Alice admonished with a small shove. She sat me down in the vanity chair and brushed through my hair.

"Doesn't Rosalie need help with something?" I growled.

"Rosalie and Esme look lovely in their dresses, and Esme's already ironing Rose's hair flat. Everyone but Edward and you are dressed."

"He's not happy either, is he?" I asked, cocking my eye at her.

"He's going to throw a fit, but I think I'll get him to wear the shirt," she said with a shrug.

"How exactly will you do that?"

"I already did it. I took all his other clothes and hid them."

"And how'd you keep that little fact from him?"

"I just focused on our dresses and the war or prices of oil whenever he was around. I couldn't even let him see his shirt or I knew he'd act against me," she said with a proud smile.

I looked into my mate's beautiful eyes and sighed. I didn't know whether to be angry or impressed at her treachery.

"You hid mine, too, didn't you?" I asked, resigned to my fate.

She just grinned at me and held out the bow tie and matching polyester jacket.

"This is a special day, Jazzy. I just want you to look your best." She wrapped her arms around my shoulders and hugged me before tying the bow tie.

"And green ruffles are my best?"

"It's mint, not green" she said, "and yes, these are the top fashion look of the year."

"It's been a remarkably bad year in the fashion world."

She smacked my shoulder.

"Graduating from an Ivy League university is a big event in your life. You want to make the most of it, and good clothing is a part of that."

"This monkey suit doesn't qualify as good anything, you minuscule tyrant," Edward yelled from his room. "And turquoise is _not_ my color."

"It matches your hair and offsets your topaz eyes," she said to the room, knowing Edward would hear it.

"And you aren't touching my hair," Edward continued. "No, not even a little."

"Baby," Alice hissed.

"If you don't shut up, she'll never give you your clothes back," Emmett yelled.

Alice made a small, satisfied noise and then kissed me on the cheek. "You're all done. Put on the coat and let's head downstairs. I can't wait to see everyone's outfits."

"You already have," I reminded her as I pulled the jacket over the sickeningly pouffy sleeves.

"Yes, but it's never quite the same. The colors are off in the visions," she said. Then her brow creased in a frown. "Drat. I wish I'd known that earlier. Ah well, it's too late now. And no, you can't wear your boots." She whirled around and headed out the door.

"What?" I asked, dumbfounded. I took off after her and instantly understood. Every time I took a step, the damn shiny shoes squeaked in protest.

I heard Edward chuckle below us.

Before we reached the large living area, Alice's hand caught mine, pulling me to a halt. Her eyes looked at me with utter seriousness.

"Jazzy, I want you to know how very proud of you I am. I know how long and hard you've had to work for this. I know how much pain you endured and how close you came to failing, but you didn't." Her face glowed as she looked at me in awe.

I'd never felt so much respect and admiration flow from her. It swelled around me, carrying me to new heights. I looked in her eyes; the yellow swallowed me, and there, in the hallway, the golden hues of her emotions flashed between us.

I caught her in my arms as she leapt for me. She wrapped herself around me and our lips met in one of the most perfect kisses of my life.

"And they say we're bad," said Emmett as he and Rosalie slipped past us.

"He's crushing your corsage," Rosalie said over her shoulder. "And you're smooshing his ruffles."

Alice's lips left mine. "I know," she sighed and dropped to the floor. "But it's worth it."

"Are we ready?" called Esme from below.

"We are, but Alice has to redo her lipstick and Jasper needs a tissue," Rosalie said as she headed down stairs.

"Are you ready to become a college graduate?" Alice asked as she cocked her head to the side and beamed at me.

"Ready as I'll ever be."

We walked into the living room to a clash of color that in any other time would sicken a human.

Edward, Emmett and I looked like lollipops next to each other in our colored tuxedos—mine light green, Edward's dark turquoise, and Emmett's purple. I silently thanked whatever force in the universe kept me from wearing Emmett's suit. I hated purple.

Esme, who would graduate with us, wore a lime green dress and matching shoes. Rosalie wore a diagonally striped dress of bright yellow and red. Alice wore a dress made of large neon yellow and white squares.

Truly, humans would need to shade their eyes from us. I know I wanted to.

"Yep," said Edward without looking at me.

Carlisle walked in, straightening his bow tie and wearing a perfectly normal black tux.

"Not fair!" roared Emmett.

"He's not graduating, yet," snapped Alice. "He doesn't need to be in fashion."

Carlisle smiled smugly and ignored us we glared at him.

"You look ravishing," he said to Esme. He held up her hand and kissed it.

I felt a small sting of pain from Edward. His eyes watched Carlisle and Esme jealously. He glanced at Alice and I.

_Sorry,_ I thought.

His shoulders sagged as he walked out.

Alice's hand tightened on mine.

"He saw us," I whispered, motioning to the top floor with my eyes. What brought me unimaginable joy caused him equal agony.

"I know," Alice said sadly.

In this haven filled with love, Edward remained the lonely outcast. Each year, he slipped away a little more. While the others saw it, only I understood how far he'd fallen in the last two decades alone. He put up a good front for them, so they had no idea how bad it had truly become.

And I'd promised to keep his secret.

"Do what you can, Jasper," Carlisle quietly requested.

I nodded, but knew better than to simply make Edward happy. He hated that. He hated anything that felt condescending, and I couldn't blame him. But the hollow ache he hid from everyone but me was slowly eating him alive.

To know what love could bring you each and every moment of your life, and yet never find it, was nothing short of slow, unending torture.

"Ready?" Carlisle's question drove my thoughts away. Edward didn't need my musings to add to his pain.

"As ready as any ruffled, purple vampire ever was," said Emmett with a bitter chuckle.

We chatted easily during our thirty-minute drive to the auditorium. College suited the Cullen clan well. We'd continue in higher education for at least another two years in Virginia, mostly so that Carlisle could finish his medical degree. Again.

Beside me, Alice chatted and fidgeted and bounced her legs. Once the car stopped, she hopped out, looking like a hyperactive rabbit.

"Whoa, there," I said with a laugh.

She whirled and kissed me, barely able to contain herself. "Isn't it perfect, Jazzy? We all get to graduate together."

I looked at my incredible angel and felt myself fall in love yet again. My skin prickled with goose bumps as I watched her eyes dance with joy. I'd do anything to keep that happiness there. Anything.

All those months of burning agony in classes full of beating hearts, countless hours of relentless self-denial, they all paid off tonight.

Tomorrow, we'd all be on our way to Alaska for a well-deserved feast. Or sort of feast. I still couldn't get over the stink.

"Un-bathed humans aren't much better," Edward reminded me. He still ached inside, but he smiled nonetheless.

"True, but their hair doesn't get stuck between my teeth."

"Oh, I hate that feeling," agreed Emmett.

Suddenly Alice's face dropped. "Oops, Edward, did you see that?"

"Yes. Maybe you shouldn't, it could be rather fun to leave it that way," he said with a light chuckle.

Alice stuck out her tongue and then turned to me. "Don't actually touch Dean Maxwell's hand when he hands you your diploma."

"Why?" Emmett and I asked together.

"No one's ever noticed it before," Esme said with a frown.

"The dean does," said Edward. "By the time Jasper goes through the line, Dr. Maxwell physically winces and backs away."

"We could do so much with that," snickered Emmett.

Just then Carlisle came up with his camera, and we all moaned.

"Oh, stop," chided Esme. "This is a once in a decade thing, and we need pictures for posterity."

"Some things aren't worth posterity," I said under my breath.

"You are _not_ taking my picture in a purple, ruffle shirt," said Emmett. "No way."

"I don't want to remember this get-up," moaned Edward. "In fact, I'm not sure I want to remember this decade."

"Everyone stand together by the portico and smile," commanded Carlisle, ignoring all the complaints.

We complied and at his cue smiled widely and said "cheese."

Three fellow graduates gasped and raced past us. Apparently, Technicolor vampires baring their teeth, even for a picture, was too much for them to take.

x~X~x

"Soon," said Alice. Her heels tapped out staccato rhythms on the floor as we sat together waiting for our names to be called.

At least here we could be married and the names printed on our diplomas were the same as on our wedding certificate.

Which also meant that we sat on the last row to be called.

"Can't you just feel the excitement?" she said.

"You're joking right? I can't get away from it."

"Ugh, Jazzy, just be happy," she said. "Please?"

"Alice, I am happy."

She kicked me, and I burst out laughing. Two students shushed me.

Emmett let out a cat-call as Esme crossed the stage and Rosalie smacked his head.

"Really?" Alice asked. She looked hard at my face. "Are you just happy to make me happy, or are you really happy because you're really happy?"

"I hate it when you ask questions like that."

"I know," she said with a grin.

"I'm happy. Today, I graduate college, which is something I never thought I'd do, with my beautiful wife at my side."

Alice sent me a dizzying wave of adoration, and I leaned over to kiss her, only to have my cap knock against hers.

"Who invented these damn things anyway?" I whispered.

Alice giggled. "I've been asking myself that for almost half a century." Her eyes narrowed. "You never thought you'd graduate college because you never wanted to _go_ to college."

"That's very true," I said with a smile. "But I've worked hard not to kill humans every hour I stayed on campus, and I succeeded in that. I took classes in subjects I enjoy and made good grades and haven't killed in over three years, which I never thought could happen. I'm happy, Alice. I'm happy because this ceremony and that sheet of paper mean something to me. I succeeded, even when I didn't think I could. For the first time since I've known you, I finally understand what you meant by needing that small piece of paper." I nodded toward the stage where a male shook hands with the dean before taking his diploma. "You were right. There's something satisfying about having something real, something I've honestly worked hard for."

My bride radiated pride and joy, then her face dropped and she whispered, "Oh, no."

We both turned to see Emmett stride up to the stage, march across, take the diploma and offer a firm handshake to Dean Maxwell. The man instantly paled.

"It's okay," I hissed, watching Emmett turn away. The dean took a deep breath and his color returned.

"No it's not," said Alice, choking back a laugh. Just then, Emmett's hand swung back and smacked the dean square on his butt.

The auditorium erupted in cheers, drowning out the panicked cry of the poor man.

_**November 1977**_

"He had to be stoned when he thought this stuff up," I said, slamming the book closed. "That or mentally unstable."

Edward looked up from the latest copy of _Popular Science_. "You're the one that wanted to study philosophy. Carlisle told you Berkley might not be the best place for that."

"It's the center of new thought and modern thinking."

"And weird hippies and bad music," added Eddie. "And don't start with the name."

"Sorry."

"No you're not."

"Nope," I said, grinning.

Edward picked up the book. "I can't understand much of what you've read, either. Why did your professor choose this book? It doesn't come across as a necessarily modern approach to philosophy, except for the motorcycle references, and those are often inaccurate."

"You noticed that, too? Professor Hydell said the book opened his mind to the vast and often misunderstood philosophy of the Far East. But I can't figure out what motorcycles and the badlands of Montana have to do with ancient oriental beliefs or Zen philosophy."

"Weird," agreed Edward as he leafed through the book. "Why would the engine run rich in Miles City? It's not even that high in altitude."

"I know! It's frustrating because nothing he says makes sense. I'm supposed to compare the philosophical approaches of the different characters, but I can't figure out what approach the narrator takes." I glared at the small book. "It makes no logical sense. Plato I can follow. Descartes, Thoreau, even Confucius-I understand them all, but this Zen thing is driving me crazy."

Edward screwed his face up. "This isn't Zen Buddhism. I've studied Buddhism, and this book has nothing to do with it. Have you asked Alice for any hints?"

"Alice said no one in class gets it. When she tried to read it, she threw the book down, said I should ask Emmett, and ran off to the wharf district with Esme."

"Emmett?" Edward chuckled and then rolled his eyes.

"I have a twelve page paper due on this tomorrow and I have no idea what to write," I fumed. "I'm over a hundred and thirty years old, dammit, and I can't even work out one stupid human's idiotic theory."

"Did Alice really say to ask Emmett?" asked Edward.

"Yup."

"Then I say we do it."

"You want me to ask the moonshiner's son about modern Zen philosophy?" I asked, dumbfounded.

"She always says these things for a reason," Edward said with a shrug.

"Sometimes the reason is because it makes her laugh afterward," I reminded him, pointing at his striped bell-bottom pants.

Edward grimaced at me and strode down to the garage.

Rosalie looked up from the bench where a carburetor lay dissected in front of her. She smirked at us as we passed by. "She was right again," she mumbled.

Edward led me to the small workspace behind the garage where Emmett listened to bluegrass while he welded. He looked up at us and shut the flame off.

For a moment all I could do was stare.

Emmett wore a bright orange paisley shirt with thick cuffs and a collar that reached to his broad shoulders. But, more importantly, he had a goatee.

"You like it?" he asked with a broad smile.

"I'm amazed by it," said Edward.

"Alice did it for me. Rosie thinks it's hot. I caught some righteous shag last night with this facial hair."

"Shag?" I asked.

"Guess," said Edward.

Emmett wriggled his eyebrows. "Booty, man."

"Oh. Was that what that was?" I asked. There were a few moments last night that the house shook. More than a few.

"Rosie said I looked like a real ruffian, you know, like a pirate. I had to oblige her," he said with a wry grin. "You should try it, Jaz. You could totally go with the cavalry theme. Horses, man. Think about it."

"No! Don't." snapped Edward. "Do you have any idea at all how disgusting that is? It's bad enough I had to leave last night. I don't need to relive it again."

"Yeah," said Emmett with a happy sigh.

"Cavalry, huh?" I asked.

"Superglue and stage hair. Trust me, it's a winning combo."

"I'll have to look into that," I said. The idea of a cavalry officer coming to the rescue of an endangered damsel sounded pretty good. I might even get to wear my boots during that little scene.

"Gah! Please focus here. Book, remember?" Edward waved the book in my face.

"Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, huh? Love that book. It changed so much of my outlook," Emmett said, perfectly serious.

"Are you serious?" asked Edward.

"Alice was right again," I said with a shrug. "I've asked her and Edward, and neither one gets it."

"Really, I'd have thought Alice could understand it. I'll talk with her later." Emmett nodded sagely but then jabbed his thumb at Edward. "And he won't get it. Not ever. He can't let anything go. To master Zen, you must first let it go."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Edward asked.

"You're the mind reader, read it," Emmett touched his head.

"I am, and it makes no more sense than this book. And keep your pirate play to yourself!"

Emmett grinned at me. "See? Told ya. He can't get it."

"Fine, genius. So teach me." Edward threw the book down on Emmett's bench.

"It can't be taught, it's something you simply do and become. It's like Rosie and engines. She's good with them because she simply _is_. Understand?"

A muscle twitched in Edward's jaw. "No."

"Didn't think you would."

"You're serious about this. You don't think I can get it." Edward looked at me helplessly, and I tried not to laugh and he glared at me.

"You have to admit, this is much more enjoyable than a classroom," I said.

"See? That's why he gets it," Emmett said, pointing at me.

"He get's it because he thinks it's funny?" Edward said. His fists clenched and released several times.

"No, he gets it because he can let it go," called Rosalie. "You need to let go and just _get_ it, Edward."

"Wait, are you telling me _Rosalie_ understands that damn book?" I asked. I began laughing.

"Let go of _what_?" Edward asked her in desperation.

"Only you can determine that," said Emmett.

"This is insanity," Edward spat. He marched back to the house.

"Do you think we pushed him a li—"

Emmett held up his hand to quiet me. In a moment, Edward's Camaro roared to life and we heard his car tear away from the house.

"Your wife is amazing," Rosalie called from the garage.

"She set this up?" I asked. That explained a lot.

"No, she told me you would be coming by to ask about the book. Rosie came up with this idea," Emmett said proudly.

"Nicely done," I called to Rosalie.

"Thanks. I enjoyed it," she replied.

"I really do understand the book, and Edward won't ever get it," Emmett said. "It's not his fault, really. He was raised to take control of things, and Zen is all about losing control of what's not yours."

"So there's real philosophy in there?" I asked indicating the hateful book.

"Not really, but it makes a few good points," Emmett said and smiled.

"Twelve pages worth of good points?" I asked.

Emmett patted the workbench. "Join me, Grasshopper, and we shall learn the ways of wisdom."

"Yes, Master," I said, bowing deeply.

"Only Rosie calls me that," said Emmett.

I shuddered and took a seat.

_**~O~**_

_**June 12, 1987 2:45 am**_

_**Alice**_

The humidity in New Orleans hung as thick and tangible as rain. The lighted streets looked hazy with damp air, and I tasted the filthy stench of the city with each breath I pulled in. New Orleans has its own special lifestyle, and its smell was just as original and hadn't changed since the last time I'd been here almost fifty years ago.

The vision of the running vampires chasing Rosalie and Emmett struck, and Edward sniggered again.

"Did you see their hair?" he asked, laughing.

"Did you see Rosalie's?"

"You want to share?" Jazzy asked, a little miffed.

"Apparently, Rosalie and Emmett ran into a, um, coven, and are being chased back here," I explained with another giggle.

His head snapped around to took at me and I had to giggle at his alarmed expression. Edward chuckled and Jazzy threw up his hands in frustration.

"Oh, good. Nothing makes me happier than being attacked by a rival coven," he snapped at us.

"This is a special coven, Jazzy. Trust me, you'll be quite happy," I said. "The only one who won't be happy is Rosalie."

"She's already not happy."

"I'm amazed you can feel her from here," Edward said.

"Her emotions feel like sitting on hot tacks, or what I think hot tack might feel like if they could puncture my skin." Jasper grimaced. "Among these intoxicated humans, she stands out like a sore thumb. Trust me, this is going to be a long night."

"Wait for it," Edward said, indicating the corner off to our right. "You'll be glad you did."

"So an attacking coven, huh?" Jazzy turned back to me.

"With horrid make-up," I added happily. I turned my attention back to the street in time to see a human vomit on his friend.

"Oh, yeah, this is worth it," grumbled Jazzy.

"It is," said Edward with a chuckle.

"Jazzy, you aren't going to believe it." I couldn't believe it, but they were coming. All of them. And Rosalie wasn't happy at all.

She was already annoyed this morning, when we all had to swipe droplets of condensation off our air-conditioned skin. Humidity and condensation were a constant issue for us in the modern age.

"This is disgusting! It's like sweat, and I do not sweat!" she'd hissed repeatedly as she flicked water off her cold skin. She and Emmett headed off to spend the evening on the Ghost and Graveyard tour and then the red light district tour. We'd hoped she would return in a better mood, but if my visions were right, she was nearing a conniption fit now.

"Oh, yeah. This will be good," Edward said with a nod.

I watched the filthy corner of New Orleans' famous Bourbon Street and prepared for the worst. Even though the odd visions showed only a hilarious encounter between our two "covens," this had the potential to go very badly.

_You're sure there's no danger?_ I asked Edward.

The edges of his mouth flicked up a little further and he rolled his eyes dismissively.

Around us, rich jazz music lent an odd backdrop to the stinking and staggering humanity that roamed the streets. At 3 am, the humans were still at it. The crowds barely thinned as the night wore on, but they did become progressively odder and more wobbly.

Then, Rosalie and Emmett rounded the corner, walking a bit more briskly than was humanly possible. Emmett's hand was on Rosalie's elbow, and he was obviously pushing her forward while her voice echoed off the walls in an exaggerated whisper—just as she should be. I smiled and waited for the show.

"-don't care at all about my hair? Who cares about freakish humans? _This_ is an issue," she grabbed a lock of the frizzy mess that resembled a wild horse's tail and glared at Emmett. "Not them!" Her hand pointed back to the corner even as Emmett tried to guide her through the drunken crowd.

Rosalie's hair looked like she'd stuck her finger in a light socket. Locks of the golden mass stuck out from her head like a Troll doll. In fact, the hair stiffly stood that way. The product Rosalie coated her hair with this morning apparently still worked. Only, instead of keeping her hair down, it glued it into the twisted mass we saw.

Edward sniggered, and Jazzy chuckled, and she growled at us, showing far too much teeth. The crowd didn't notice.

"We need to go," said Emmett, tilting his head the way they'd come. He opened the door for Rosalie who glared at Edward again.

"I know what you're thinking, moron, and it isn't funny," Rosalie said as she pushed down on the stiff mass. "_This_ is why I hate the south!"

"For the love of God, Rosalie! It's just hair. Everyone's was frizzy today," Edward snapped.

"Not mine," said Emmett proudly. His short curls were locked in an upright, punk position by a hair product that resembled Superglue. He'd even painted the spikes bright blue. "Now, we need to go, Bro!"

Edward wasn't paying any attention. He smiled at the street corner Emmett had just come from and nodded with his head.

"Show time," he mumbled.

Jazzy stepped forward for a better look, and to block me from any harm. He was so paranoid.

Half a dozen humans were running towards us, breathing heavily and wet with sweat. They were excited beyond measure even though they were obviously tired from the run.

"My God, look at them," Edward said. "I knew some of them tried this stuff, but I never thought I'd meet one. Your vision didn't do them justice, Alice."

The humans were dressed in gothic clothing complete with full body piercings, brightly colored spiked hair, and capes. And fangs.

The pale paste they used on their skin dripped off their faces in varying degree, staining the black clothing with white beads. The dark, dripping smudges under their eyes made them look like twisted versions of harlequin clowns.

The group pulled to a stop a dozen feet or so from us, each face a mask of joy.

"My God, look at them!" a girl with particularly badly done makeup said in a hushed whisper. Her awed face held a plethora of piercings, most of which held nails, screws or safety pins. In fact, all the humans had hardware of some type sticking out of various holes all over their bodies.

This type of situation was exactly what we tried to avoid, and normally I'd have worried, but the baby diaper pin in her nose was in the shape of a ducky, and I couldn't help but stare.

"It's perfect!" I whispered and snatched Emmett's camera from the front seat to snap a picture. Carlisle and Esme would love this when we got home.

We all stared at each other, vampire to fauxpire for a moment before another female spoke.

"I knew there were more of us." She grinned at Edward who made a retching noise.

"You look awesome. Where did you get the makeup?" asked the large male with oddly shaped objects where his nipples should be. He smiled winsomely at Emmett.

I felt a wave of nauseatingly strong sexual tension wash through us. The humans all sighed and looked at us vampires longingly. Two of the males shifted stances as if they'd become suddenly uncomfortable.

"I. Will. Kill. You. For. That." Edward growled at my mate.

"As you said, it's show time." Jazzy winked at me.

"You're the most realistic child of the night I've ever seen," gushed the female with the duck in her nose. She stepped closer to Edward, obviously undressing her with her eyes. "I'd love to feel your fangs," she said, undressing him with her eyes.

"I just bet you would," said Rosalie.

"You'd be disappointed at the size," Emmett whispered to ducky nose. "You need a man with real fangs." He gave her a smile and she nearly swooned.

"We get the makeup in Hollywood," I said as I tried to hide my laughter.

"The contacts are special order," Jazzy added.

"I'd love to get you guys back to our lair. Hey, maybe you could spend the night with our coven. We could have some fun until coffin time," said the duck-nosed female. She grinned at Emmett. "Then the fun could really begin." She ran her tongue across her fake fangs.

"Thanks, but we need to head back to our own accommodations. We can't risk sunlight, you know," I said truthfully. We didn't need to hide anything from these idiots.

"We know, man, we know," said nipple vamp. "People don't understand how hard it is to follow the Calling. But once you become a child of the night, there's no going back."

"So true," said Emmett.

Nipple vamp looked at him and gave him a longing smile. "You have magnificent hair," he said to Emmett.

"And your... fangs are impressive," said Emmett, his voice cracking. He nodded to the others before hopping in beside Rosalie. The rest of us quickly loaded the car and managed to drive off before we broke out into roaring laughter.

X~O~X

Jazzy pulled up to the cabana we'd rented. Our laughter died until we shut the door behind us.

"Never in all my years," chuckled Jazzy. "Never! Overly sexed punk vampires with badly done makeup." He shook his head as if he couldn't quite believe it.

"Fauxpires!" I corrected.

"That's brilliant!" howled Emmett.

Even Edward laughed now that he wasn't bombarded with the lustful thoughts of fanged freaks.

"It wasn't that funny," complained Rosalie, but then she snorted. "Okay. Maybe it was."

"The fangs were hilarious," said Edward.

"And piercings. And ducky safety pins," Jazzy said before breaking out into chuckles again. "Carlisle and Esme will never believe this."

"It's creepy!" Rosalie said. Then she caught sight of her reflection and hufed. "I'm taking a shower and taming this mess."

I caught a brief vision of Rosalie throwing her brush at the mirror and shattering both. "I'll go with you," I offered. "That job may take both of us. " Another vision of me cussing at her hair flashed in my mind. "Maybe a nice French braid or bun would work."

"I hate the south," Rosalie repeated as she headed to their suite.

I'd just finished placing the last band on Rosalie's braid, which she'd finally chosen after I convinced her the ocean wind would do more damage than the humidity, when Jazzy called me back to the main living area.

The boys stood around the television, dressed in their sailing outfits. A few days and nights on and in the Caribbean Sea promised to raise all our spirits after four long years in high school in Montana. Our next home would be in Pennsylvania at one of Carlisle's old mansions, but the family decided to take a year off before moving there and travel the world by boat. The yacht we'd purchased waited for us at the nearby dock.

"Carlisle called and wanted you to see this morning's news," Edward said, staring intently at the television. "Did you see anything changing in our future?"

I took a look and saw nothing unusual. "I go to the car and use the mobile phone, but that's all," I said.

We watched the CNN anchor run through the list of latest news items. Nothing came to me as he reported on each one in turn.

"It should be next," Jazzy told me.

"In a rare and confrontational speech at the Berlin Wall today, President Reagan pushed Russian Premier Gorbachev to allow more freedom. The seven minute speech…"

"They'll play a clip in a minute," Emmett said.

My mind was already searching the future. Ever since the Cold War, I'd kept a constant surveillance of the future and the maneuverings of human politicians.

The short clip played, a sound bite of only a few seconds, but to my mind, it brought a flood of potential futures.

"Is it bad?" asked Jazzy.

I saw an older man, a strange, purple mark marring his balding head. He played the speech repeatedly on a VCR.

"He's bluffing," said a beautiful older woman in Russian.

"Yes," agreed the older man. "But he's right."

Then, faint and fuzzy, I saw hordes of people attacking something. War perhaps? The scene shifted slightly, and I recognized the wall behind Reagan, only now it swarmed with people. They weren't attacking each other, and no one attacked them. Even more visions hit, still more vague, but I could tell they were of protests in Eastern Europe. Peaceful protests.

"No, Jazzy, I think it might just be very good. I need you for a moment." I headed out to the car, making a mental note that we needed to cast off soon or we'd be trapped by the sun. However, this would only take a few minutes.

"She's calling her old coven mates in New York," explained Edward to an unspoken question.

"Alice?" asked Jazzy.

"The speech sets something in motion. I'm not sure what, exactly, but things are changing in the Soviet Union, and they will continue to change. I think things just might get better."

"You don't owe them anything," he whispered to me. "They tried blackmailing you to make us stay in New York."

"They were my friends for two decades. I fought side by side with them." I turned to look at my mate. "I'm not doing this just for them, Jasper. I'm doing this to complete a promise. I'm doing it for me." I pulled the car door open and yanked out the shoe sized car phone. This number couldn't possibly be traced.

"Do you want me to leave?" he asked me.

I shook my head. "I want you to hold me."

His arms instantly cradled me against him. I held the phone and dialed the number my vampire brain would never forget. With each jab at the keypad, anger and quilt jostled for my attention. Suddenly, they left and I felt calm and protected.

"I love you," I said.

"I know."

I pushed the final button.

"Yes." Lena's voice came from the earpiece and a thousand memories descended on me like stone.

"Lena, it's Alice." I waited an eternal moment.

"It's… good to hear from you. Truly," she said. Her voice held sincerity, but sincerity is a lie we're all good at.

"I wanted to let you know that the Soviet Union is about to fall. It will happen in the next few years. You asked me once to tell you when you could return home. It's time to start preparing," I said.

I heard her sharp intake of breath. "Are you sure?" she asked almost too quickly.

"I'm sure. It will take a few years, but you can go home soon." I closed my eyes as images of my teddy bear vampires played through my mind. So many good memories undone by one very bad one.

"What about Mai-Li and Chi-Yang?" she asked.

"Taiwan," I said simply. "China will most likely follow suit within a decade, and they can set up a home there and run their import empire there."

"I'll let them know. And, Alice? Was the wedding everything you wanted?"

"My whole life is everything I wanted." Still, my chest ached for my one-time friends.

Jazzy's arms tightened.

"So, you're happy?"

"I'm very happy," I said. I suddenly felt sorry for the ancient vampires. They'd all been born into a life of blood and killing as a human, and now they remained trapped there for all eternity. "I hope this news gives you some happiness as well."

The line went dead, but a small part of my silent heart felt lighter. I'd done what I said I'd do, and with that, the last link to my old life dropped away.


	9. Chapter 9

**Thanks to all who wait patiently for my life to allow me to post these chapters, and a huge thanks to Abbyweyr and Lovepath for being my super betas!**

**All of this belongs to Stephenie Meyer, whether she wants it or not.**

* * *

**September 13, 1987**

_**Jasper**_

"Well?"

I sat back and licked my lips. "Howler monkey isn't bad. In fact, of all the horrid, stinking animals I've eaten, howler monkey ranks way up there."

"See, I told you," Alice gave me a smug smile. "You should trust me, you know."

"It might have even had more taste than a wolf, but the darn things are so small it's hard to get a taste." I smacked my lips together and tried to get a little more of the blood's bouquet.

"Wait till we get to Africa. You'll love the lions," Alice said. I wondered how close to human chimpanzee blood tasted, or better yet, gorillas. Not that we'd try one, being endangered and all.

"Not bad, Alice," Emmett called through the trees. "Fun chase, too." He and Rosalie appeared near us, jumping and swinging from the thick branches of the Amazon canopy just as the monkeys had.

"I still think the wildlife park could work," Rosalie said. She tossed a monkey carcass aside and sat next to Alice. "Not only would it be a money maker, but we could do taste tests and such."

"I think people might notice if we kept importing animals," I said. I knew why she wanted one. Rosalie loved staying on the East Coast. Other than a small town in Washington, the east coast remained her favorite place. With the post war boom of the 50's, however, many of the hunting grounds no longer supported us. We'd been throwing around the idea of a wild animal sanctuary for the last few years, but we couldn't quite figure out how to make it work.

Besides, captive animals taste funny.

The forest air was thick and silent, a sharp contrast from when we began our hunt. Then, the sound of the animals was almost deafening to our ears.

"It's beautiful," whispered Rosalie as we watched the mist transform the world around us.

Suddenly, Tarzan's call rang out around us.

"Oh, he didn't just do that did he," I groaned.

Alice giggled, "It's going to get so much worse."

Emmett began giggling like a little girl. That always threw me. Someone so huge shouldn't giggle like that.

"Two miles!" Edward's voice rang out. "Two miles, and I can still hear their thoughts!" A moment later, he nearly crashed into us. I really did feel badly for him at moments like this.

"How can they look so proper and be so..."

"Horny?" Emmett finished my sentence.

"He was a Puritan for God's sake," spat Edward. "Can't he be a little more reserved about these things?"

"He seems to enjoy enacting movies," I mentioned.

Emmett snorted. "Remember 'Excalibur?'"

We all chuckled guiltily. None of us had been prepared for what we'd heard that time.

Alice moaned, followed by Edward.

"Can't you keep your mind somewhere else?"

"Can't you?' she retorted. "Maybe we should do something while we wait for Tarzan to rescue Jane and come swinging through the branches."

"How about a race to that waterfall and back?" Emmett pointed through the mist to a distant ridge. A thin line of white marked where the water fell.

"That's a great idea!" Edward jumped up and waited for us to follow.

Alice moaned again, and joined him. "The further the better."

"Go!" Emmett yelled, and we ran, playfully shoving each other over.

We didn't leave fast enough to avoid hearing another wild call, this time it was answered by Esme.

That old vampire was insatiable.

"It's not him that's insatiable," said Edward. He slowed and we ran together. "Esme looks so prim and proper, but it's all a ruse."

_You need to spend some time away from us, don't you?_

"You have no idea," he said with another moan. "It's bad enough at home, but you all get so adventurous on vacation."

"Maybe Rio will be better," I suggested. Our year of travels officially began last June, but Carlisle and Esme finally joined us a few days ago, and we'd be heading to Africa on the yacht after spending a few days on Isle Esme.

"You obviously haven't been around Brazilians much. Let's just say, Emmett will be right at home there. It'll be interesting to see how you do with it." He eyed me as we ran.

I couldn't tell if it was because he didn't think I could stand the humans or the lust. I wasn't sure which would be worse, either.

~X~

"So, which is it?" Edward asked. "Lust or blood?"

I looked up at Edward and grimaced. Around us the crowded streets of Rio flashed and danced in a thousand colors, sounds and smells. Overriding it all was sexual desire so intense that it drowned everything else out.

"Lust. Definitely lust." I dodged the undulating crowd and shifted my trousers around. "I can hold my breath to keep out the smell and the loud street music camouflages the sound of their hearts that beat nearby, but the lust is... painful."

"So you've moved on from being uncomfortable because of blood to being uncomfortable because of hormones?" He chuckled.

"It's not like you're enjoying this."

"Nope, not at all. But I am rather glad to have someone to commiserate with." Suddenly his head turned and he scanned the buildings on the hill to our left.

"More of them?" I asked, instantly alert. I scanned each building and pulled Alice in a little closer.

"They haven't seen us. They're heading to the western hills." He glanced at Alice. "They didn't seem to know of Paolo's coven."

Alice nodded and went back to watching the crowed. "I still don't see any danger," she said flatly. Their loss hurt even though she'd known what would happen.

Edward nodded and then winced. "Not that," he moaned.

Raw lust, the kind only a vampire feels, struck me from the side like I'd been hit. I looked over to see Emmett and Rosalie so entwined in a samba style dance that I couldn't quite figure out how their clothes didn't shred.

"They're amazing," Alice said. I felt her mood lift.

"Not here," hissed Esme. Neither vampire stopped. "Stop that this instant. We are in the middle of a crowded road in a vampire-infested city. Don't you make me come over there," she said a little louder. Nothing happened.

Esme stepped over to the couple and raised her hands. She hit their heads together hard and so quickly that no human could have seen it. She even did it to the beat of the music, which impressed me.

Rosalie and Emmett slowly pulled apart and glared at her, but neither said anything as they walked toward us. Rosalie leaned against Emmett and continued to dance, her hips swaying against him. His arms wrapped around her shoulders, keeping her in place.

"No one even noticed," said Edward incredulously. He went back to scanning the crowd and looking miserable and I went back to focusing on keeping us safe and trying to ignore the raging emotions around me.

Rio reeked of humans and vampires, and we'd only be here for a few days. Of course, we blended in so well with the humans here that there was little danger of being confronted during the short time we stayed, but we all kept our eyes open as we took in the sights and sounds and feelings of Rio's hot night.

I kept my mate close. She didn't need my protection, but she did need my gift.

"I'm sorry," I whispered as we made our way through the thick crowds.

Esme and Rosalie were entranced as they walked, but Alice barely looked around. Melancholy dripped from her.

"I knew it would happen," she said. "I didn't see it, but I knew it would. They got greedy."

"Most of our kind live less than a decade or two," I reminded her. "Especially in a city like this one."

"They had to have known that, Alice," Edward said. She nodded.

"They knew, but they didn't care." She looked around at the plastered walls and swaying crowd, and the look of guilt on her face matched the feeling coming from her. "I came here last time with the New York Coven. Everything went badly. We fought, and I killed humans for blood. I found out here that I couldn't live in both worlds. I'd hoped that Maria and Paolo somehow managed to do it."

"It isn't your fault, Alice," Carlisle said in his gentle way. "Once they become greedy for blood, most vampires' days are numbered. Their bloodlust costs them their lives. It always does."

We'd searched for two days, but found no evidence of Alice's friends. The home they'd inhabited smelled of unknown vampires. We needed no further evidence to know what had happened.

This city with its thousands of homeless humans was a treasure trove for a vampire, and I would have fought to keep it as my own once. But that was a long time ago, and now the metropolis simply annoyed me.

I looked around at our group, walking tightly together down the brightly lit street. Colors pounded our eyes as every surface screamed with vibrant paint, bright flowers, or patterned cloth.

We came to an open square where a street band played. Carlisle grabbed Esme's hands and spun her around. Emmett laughed at them and he and Rosie began a much less physical dance.

I turned to Alice and offered my hand. Her smile didn't quite touch her eyes, but it was a start. We began her favorite bossa nova while Edward scanned the buildings around us.

Once, I would have gorged myself here. Now, I danced in designer clothing beside vampires I called my family.

"Weird," I muttered under my breath and then twirled my mate under my arm.

~X~

The ocean east of Rio is dotted with islands, each becoming smaller than the first as you go out to sea. Isle Esme is one of the few anomalies. Still small, its dormant volcanic cone, now covered entirely with thick underbrush and trees, ensured both privacy and enough area for the family to play. A waterfall fell from the triangular peak, giving the island a coveted fresh water supply. As vampires, we couldn't care less, but it was nice to wash the salt water off.

Once we arrived, us "children" promptly went back out to sea to play while Carlisle and Esme inspected the new generator and electrical outlets that the home now boasted. None of us wanted to be around while they inspected the rest of the house.

We took to the sea, looking for some privacy of our own. The small island Alice and I had found was no more than a tree-covered bump in the ocean, but for now it was our bump. The eastern edge had a thin strip of pristine sand riddled with a rainbow of tiny shells. Alice's bare body lay amid the sand, a glistening crystal against the white.

I looked out at the intense blue-green of the sea. The colors still amazed me. I'd never seen such vivid hues reflected in water.

"It's so beautiful," said Alice next to me. I heard the sand and shells shift and looked back at an even more beautiful image. She stretched out beside me, her back arched, and arms and legs splayed out, soaking up the warmth and sunlight.

It was an invitation I couldn't resist.

I leaned over and put my mouth right over her projected chest. She giggled and wove her fingers through my tangled hair.

"Your tongue tickles," she laughed, and then squirmed as I applied it more fervently. With a kick of her legs, I was suddenly under her, her body pressing hard against mine. She wriggled again, and then stretched her arms up and out. "Can't you just feel the warmth?" she asked.

"Hmmmm." She placed her hands on either side of my head and leaned over me. The imp dangled the objects of my attention in front of my face.

"What should we do about this?" She shifted her weight, and I moaned happily.

"I suggest you use your imagination, Mrs. Whitlock," I said. She smiled at me, jumped up, and raced into the water.

"Will I ever learn?" I groaned to myself.

I rushed after her, following her easily in the clear water. Her glistening body pulsed through the water tantalizingly just out of reach. She dove deeper, and my eyes registered the change in color rather than clarity. She darted behind a series of stone outcroppings. I shot around the other side, scattering fish and eels in my haste to catch my elusive and alluring prey.

Of course, she'd seen that move, so I wasn't surprised to feel her behind me before her arms and legs wrapped around me, pinning my own and plunging us deeper into the dark blue color. I felt her giggle in her triumph, but I'd meant to be caught. I enjoyed the feel of her body pressed hard against mine and her legs wrapped tightly around my torso. I turned to grin at her, and she smacked me.

We fell slowly down, almost as if flying, as the sea turned ultramarine blue around us. I had no idea what was below us, and I didn't care. The feel of her body, almost, but not quite, weightless here in the deep blue ocean had me focusing on only the possibility of loving her without gravity. She felt the lust and gave me a brilliant smile before wrapping her body around me in an entirely different way. My hands ran along her exquisite curves before she maneuvered again, and I held her against me.

My mate was a genius.

x~X~x

It was morning before we returned to our little haven of peace. We lay in the sand, simply feeling each other, and letting the colors of our emotions wash through us. They never dimmed, those brilliant hues of love.

Alice relaxed against me as the most recent wave washed away. I felt her leave for just a moment before she sighed.

"We should get back to Edward. Rosalie and Emmett left him again."

I didn't let my frustration show in any way. She was right. The years passed us by, leaving us all unchanged except for one way. I loved my mate more than ever. That simple thing grew, making each monotonous day of thirst worth everything.

Edward didn't have that, and the years wore on him, hollowing him out just as they'd done to Carlisle and I. Only it was worse for him because he knew exactly what he was missing.

"Where is he?" I asked as I rose. "And what shall we do about clothing?" Showing up naked probably wouldn't help Edward's mood.

"He's exploring the shipwrecks Carlisle told us about. I stowed swimsuits in a bag hanging from the yacht." She grinned at me. "Of course I saw this."

I sighed and we stood to go rescue our lonely brother.

Suddenly, Alice's hands dropped to her side. It was the briefest of visions, but she looked at me befuddled.

"Did you see Rosalie and Emmett again?" If she did, I wanted specifics.

"No," she said, tilting her head to the side and viewing the vision again.

"If it's Carlisle and Esme, don't tell me."

"It's human eyes," she said, looking at me with that cute, confused look again. "Brown eyes, deep chocolate ones."

"That's it? Brown eyes? We're off the coast of Brazil. All the humans have brown eyes." I didn't say it, but I could tell by the concentration on her face that she was trying to determine if I would make a mistake with the owner of those eyes.

"I know! That's why I can't understand it. Stupid visions," she huffed.

"What were you thinking of before you had it?" I asked. We walked into the waves, heading northwest towards the shipwrecks.

"That's what I don't understand, either. I was thinking of Edward, worrying about him and trying to see his future, and these brown eyes just popped up out of nowhere."

"I wonder if _he's_ going to bite the owner of those brown eyes," I mused. It would do him some good to make a mistake. Might take him down a peg or two, though I didn't dare say that out loud.

Alice gave me an exasperated look and shoved me.

"Try again," I suggested. I didn't want to kill anyone on a family vacation, and Edward would mope for years if he did it.

Alice paused for a moment, and once again, I felt her slip away from me. When she returned, she was piqued.

"Oh, _that's_ much better," she said, throwing her hands into the air and glaring at me.

"What? Do I kill the human?"

"No. I tried to connect Edward to the eyes, and do you know what popped up? A damn truck. I give up!"

"You don't have to be right all the time, Alice," I said to soothe her.

She stuck her tongue out at me, stormed toward the breaking waves and dove under.

o~X~o

_**April 1991**_

_**Alice**_

"Stop shaking! You're going to unbolt something," Rosalie hissed from behind me.

I turned and stuck my tongue out at her. Jasper immediately calmed me, but we both knew it wouldn't last. I was still more excited than I'd been in a long time.

While in Europe, I saw Chi-Yang and Mai-Li, the last vampires of the New York coven, leave the city. It was finally safe for me to return to my beloved home, and in a few short hours, we would be at JFK.

Across from me Esme busily looked through the spring fashion lines while Carlisle caught up on a few medical journals. On the other side, Edward listened to his Walkman looking pained.

"Not pain. Despair," he mumbled without looking up from the novel he pretended to read. "We just bought out half of Paris, and now you need to shop in New York, too?"

_Don't you dare ruin this with your sorry attitude. I will make you pay if you do!_

He snorted softly. "Compared to what Jasper and Emmett have planned, I'm the least of your worries."

Beside me, Jasper seemed to sink into the seat.

"Jerk," Emmett hissed.

I searched our future frantically. The fashion show looked promising, and I was absolutely sure the sour look on Edward's face didn't mean anything. Honestly, men are such babies. I looked to the baseball game, and nothing changed there.

"_Shopping_?" I gasped. When I looked to that future, I saw mass hysteria in the Saks bargain basement. "You wouldn't!"

I whirled on my mate who pressed himself against the window.

"It was just a fun idea," he protested. "And Edward's right; we just shopped in Europe, why not just enjoy the sights of New York, and leave the fashion world in peace?" His hands were up as if I were about to hit him. Which I'd never do in public. I'd take care of him in private.

"Besides, we haven't even figured out how to do it yet," added Emmett.

"Snakes apparently. And the fact that you didn't know how doesn't make up for wanting to do it in the first place." I glared at Jasper and then turned on Emmett. "You should be ashamed of yourself. Rosalie, Esme and I were looking forward to it."

Emmett only grunted apologetically, but that may have been because Rosalie's fingers were pinching his inner thigh.

"Perhaps we should leave the_ boys _to their own devices and meet them after we shop," suggested Esme who glared at Jasper and then Emmett.

"Fine." I crossed my arms and sat stiffly in the seat.

"Sorry, Darlin'," Jasper said dejectedly. I turned an icy stare to him and went back to check all possible futures ahead of us. If the boys were that committed to ruining a perfectly good shopping trip, I couldn't be too careful.

My mind automatically went to the fashion show first. How I missed those. I felt myself smile. The hideous shoulder pads had finally deflated, and I might actually find something from an American designer. Rosalie and Esme were going to have a blast.

With an inward moan, I realized the boys would be having fun as well.

"Ignore what you saw, Edward. If you three go to Coney Island without us, I will find a way to make you pay that rivals the hair dye." I said it out loud to clearly get the warning to all of them.

I let my mind run back to the endless possibilities of the city. We'd only be there a few days, but even we vampires would be hard pressed to fit in all we wanted to do. Spring Break needed to be much, much longer.

Jasper's hand squeezed mine. I looked up and his eyes motioned to my leg, which tapped so fast I knew a human would only see it as a blur. I stilled it immediately and gave him a sheepish grin.

Then I saw a stewardess peek around the curtain and look around the cabin. She appeared to be slightly panicked, obviously trying to find the source of the thrumming.

"Can I help you with something, miss?" Carlisle asked easily.

The stewardess blushed and stammered, "I'm s-s-sorry to bother you, but the pilot—"

Just then, the overhead speaker crackled. "Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. As you might have felt, we are experiencing some unusual turbulence in the form of a rapid vibration. As a precaution, please fasten your seat belts and remain seated until the turbulence stops."

"And you got mad at _us_ for scaring the humans," Emmett said with a chuckle.

~O~

I barely recognized the street.

Of all the unimaginable changes New York had undergone in the last forty years, that one small fact bothered me most. Even seeing the "for sale" sign out in front of Ivan's old mansion was better than not recognizing this very human place.

The row of brownstones hadn't altered much, of course, but all the old trees had long ago been torn up and the small yards taken out to widen the street.

_Is it like this for you?_

"Every time—though it gets easier as the years go by. It's why Carlisle took the old cross before it could be destroyed," Edward said.

Rosalie looked down the foggy street. "I have a porcelain doll," she said. "And my silver hairbrush."

I felt another twinge of sadness. I'd never have anything from my human life, not even a real name. The brownstone was as close as I ever got to humanity. We walked down the street making no noise as we passed. At four in the morning, there were only a handful of humans about, but the few that saw us stared at our obviously pale skin. The neighborhood in East Tremont appeared to be far more diverse, and far more impoverished, than it had been forty years ago. Rap and merengue music competed with each other from scattered windows in the still air that reeked of exhaust fumes. Another brush of peace touched me, and I wondered for a second how bad I really was. I'd become so used to Jasper that I didn't even notice him lifting my moods, but then again, I never wanted to feel without him. He took our pain so effortlessly, and gave me unimaginable joy.

"What do you have from your old house?" Jasper asked Edward.

Edward shrugged a little too easily. "A few valuables my parents had on them when they died, just a pocket watch and some jewelry. I left some of the old furniture in Chicago as well."

"Did you leave anything behind?" Esme asked me.

"No, but Edwina and Myrtle both stored a few things up in the attic. I know we find them, but I'm not sure there's anything important. It's a long shot," I admitted, "but if there is any chance I can find something from my years here, I want to try."

"It's worth the time to look," said Carlisle. "The years pass so quickly, and our memories may never fail, but it's always good to have something you can touch."

I stopped in front of the correct address. I'd once known every part of this home, but everything besides the form had changed. From one of the bedrooms, rap music sent a staccato beat into the night. For a moment, my mind looked backwards instead of forward. The street narrowed, parked cars disappeared, and trees grew and overspread the road. Streetlights shrunk into the small, warm glow of gaslights. I could almost hear the clop of the milkman's wagon as his horse lazily delivered his wares in the early hours.

"So different," whispered Edward.

I easily scaled the wall to the small window of the attic, cursing the flimsy, modern aluminum rainspout as I did. Steel withstood vampires so much better.

Despite the dark night, I could see my old room clearly.

"It's pretty packed with junk," I whispered to my family below. "I think only two or three of us will fit." I easily popped the small window open. The room beyond was a cluttered mess of boxes, bags and forgotten things. I could only hope it had stayed that way for forty years.

"What are we looking for?" asked Jasper as he slid through the window.

"There was a false wall that I hid the girls' things behind." I easily picked up a stack of boxes and gently set them aside. I heard several small creatures scurry away.

Edward entered next and within a few seconds, the entire mass of junk and memories cluttered the far wall. I touched the cracked wallpaper, and remembered for a moment the pride I'd felt putting it up. This had been my first real room, my _own_ place.

Both men stopped and let me look around. The walls still held the mint green paint which now looked faded and as cracked as the wallpaper. The lace curtain I'd put up hung in tatters next to the window.

It felt like yesterday I'd done all the decorating. I felt as if I could walk down the stairs and greet the two old, cantankerous sisters.

"It was a lifetime ago," Edward said quietly.

I nodded as I felt Jasper's strength flow through me.

"A lifetime," I whispered. I reached beneath the baseboard and pulled back. The wall swung open with a quiet moan. The opening behind it smelled of mothballs and old women. Even though it stank, the smell was an oddly comforting smell.

Inside, two small trunks and a box sat unchanged by the years. We each grabbed one and exited the house. I pulled the window tight and, once my feet hit the cement below, we all ran through the heavy fog until we could take to the roofs.

"I remember that smell," said Esme with delight as I opened the box. Two cakes of lye soap lay on top of old letters and neatly wrapped packages. "They used the lye soap to keep mice and pests away."

"I remember what it tastes like," said Emmett with a chuckle. "I must have had a cake of it shoved in my mouth almost every day. Nasty stuff." He took a long sniff and Edward made a retching noise the second before Emmett's tongue flicked out and licked the cracked soap.

Emmett shuddered and tossed the bar back onto the table. "Ugh. Just as bad as I remembered."

"You had to _taste_ it to come to that conclusion?" Jazzy asked, a smile playing on his lips. "I may not recall much of my human life, but I remember that stuff all too well."

"I was just reliving my past," Emmett said with another shudder. "Sometimes, I miss even the bad parts."

"Those must have been Hank's and Myrtle's love letters," said Rosalie. She leaned in for a closer look, even though her eyes didn't need it. She did it to be a little closer to humanity, a little closer to a time she longed to return to.

"There are photographs underneath," said Carlisle.

"I know." I slowly slid my fingers under the old letters and pulled out five faded images. "This was their tailor shop," I said. As I looked at the yellowed photo of a young Hank and Myrtle standing in front of the tiny storefront, I felt the strange fullness that comes to my eyes every so often.

"The back says 'First day of business,'" Esme told me.

I flipped over the picture. "Eighteen-eighty-seven," I whispered. "I'd forgotten how old they really were."

Rosalie picked up a small image of Myrtle and a sewing machine.

"I hated that contraption," I said with a small laugh. "Stupid pedal driven machine. I can still hear the clicking rhythm it made as it fought me with every stitch."

I pulled open the first steamer trunk, and the smell of mothballs assailed me. Inside the trunk lay several dozen Kippahs. Some were embroidered, and some crocheted, but all were handmade. Past the chemical reek of mothballs, I could smell Hank's and Myrtle's scents on the caps and on the prayer shawls which lay underneath. Memories as clear as the day they happened assailed me with each breath, and for a moment I expected to hear their voices as they chatted away in their shop.

"It's why I don't get rid of the furniture in my home in Chicago," said Edward. "It's like a small piece of them is still there."

I nodded and smiled at him, but didn't speak. Jazzy's arm came around me.

"I'm glad you went back for these," he said.

"Is there anything left at all?" Esme asked him.

"Tombstones. I never found my sister's, but I can't rightly remember her name, and it would have changed anyway."

He gave a small shrug, but I clearly felt the sad, hollow feeling that passed through me.

"Can we go back to the Rochester area yet?" Rosalie asked. "I just want to go back home, back to a place I have memories."

"It's been almost seventy years," Carlisle said. "I've usually waited at least a century, but I don't see a problem with it. Are you sure you want to return to your birthplace? Sometimes it can be a rather painful experience."

"Everything will have changed," Esme said as she touched Rosalie's shoulder. "And sometimes, memories don't bring a feeling of home."

"I think her thirty-two trips to Rochester would have expunged her pain," said Edward with an eye roll.

"We could go to Chicago," suggested Esme.

Edward only shook his head. "I love to visit, but the city is hard to live in." What he didn't say was that the turn of the century house, which served as the offices for several of our business ventures, also served as a refuge of sorts—a place where he could be alone with the crushed dreams of his past.

"I liked that big old house in the Olympic Peninsula," said Emmett. "It's the first place I called home once I could control my thirst. If we go to Rochester, maybe we can head there afterward. That house is big enough for all of us."

The family grew silent around us, and Jasper tensed.

"What's wrong with the Olympic Peninsula?" he asked.

"Wolves," said Emmett.

"I like wolf," shrugged Jazzy.

"Not these," Emmett said with a twisted smile. "These are _werewolves_."

"I will not allow Alice near a werewolf," Jazzy snapped. His stance changed in an instant as he challenged anyone to argue with him.

"He's had experience with the real kind," Edward explained.

"Do you know how hard those damn things are to kill? I lost seven soldiers to one lone werewolf._ One_." Jazz pulled down his collar to show three long scars. "The monster gave me this with one swipe of his claw."

"These are shape shifters, not true werewolves. A small, local tribe carries a gene that allows their young men to shift into wolf form—" Carlisle began.

"Big, stinky wolf form," Rosalie interrupted.

"Wolves always stink," I reminded her.

"Not like this. This is _bad_!" Emmett said with his face scrunched up.

I looked to any future, curious to find out more about these shape shifters, but nothing came. Of course, we hadn't made a decision.

"Look, there's a new town there now," Esme said. She'd pulled an atlas out of her attaché case and stood looking at the map of Washington State. " If we lived in that old house, the one we re-built, we could go to that town rather than Hoquiam, and perhaps we could stay away from the native tribes. This little town, Forks, is closer to the house than Hoquiam is." She looked at the map again. "I loved living there. Do you think any of them are still alive?" she asked Carlisle.

"I doubt it, but the legend will still be told, if the tribe is still intact. To answer your question, Jasper, I don't know how dangerous they are because we never fought them because we have a treaty with the Quiluete Tribe."

"Let me get this straight. You want to go back to a place that reeks of stinking wolves that may or may not be able to destroy us?" Jazzy crossed his arms and glared at the family.

"We still have two years in Pennsylvania," Carlisle said evenly. "After that, we can go to Rochester if you'd like, Rosalie. I'd love to return to the Olympic Mountains because it's so easy to live there, but Jasper is correct, we need to proceed with caution."

Just then, I got a vision of a weathered white house standing in the middle of tall pines and thick ferns. "The old Victorian-style house?" I asked.

"Yes," Esme nodded. "It was one of the first ones I completely gutted and rebuilt to meet our needs. Do we move in?"

"All I see is us looking at it," I said. I closed my eyes and concentrated on the house. "It's beautiful, Esme. And the forest is incredible." I looked at my mate. "I saw nothing more than the house, and it's totally secluded, Jazzy. We'd be able to be truly alone and away from humans."

"It's easily defendable on three sides, Jasper," Carlisle said. "If the shape shifters are still alive, we can make sure they aren't a threat to the home."

"Perhaps we can return to check on the home and contact the tribal elders," mused Esme. "If they honor the treaty, the wolves won't be an issue. In fact, they help keep others of our kind away."

"I can't see any wolves at all." I looked harder. "They simply aren't in our future right now."

"Maybe they don't exist any more," said Rosalie with a hint of relief. "I really don't like that wet dog smell."

_Author's Note:_

_I know it's been a long time coming, but our next stop is Forks, so the wait is almost over._


	10. Chapter 10

_****_There is no way to thank a beta. Really, you have no idea how wonderfully patient and purposefully forceful they can be. Thank you LovePath. You rock my Twilight universe.

* * *

_**Alaskan wilderness near Denali National Park, March 1999**_

_**Jasper**_

"It's all in the way you stroke it with your hands. That's the secret to size, firm and gentle pressure." I watched as Emmett showed me the stroking motion he'd been using.

"I thought temperature had something to do with it as well," I said. Emmett did seem to have this down to an art.

"Nah, not for us. It makes no difference since we're already so cold. Just press gently and keep your hands in motion. Keep it steady though, like this."

"Impressive." I had to admit I'd never seen anyone get one so large.

"Big, isn't it?" Emmett clapped me on the back and went back to rolling the enormous base of his snowman.

"He's gonna make you take that down," I said. The ball was thirty-two feet in diameter and still growing. "It's big enough to see from the air."

"I _want_ it to be big enough to see from the air. And I know Carlisle will make me take it down. I'm not making a monument or anything—I'm making the world's biggest snowman." Emmett began smoothing the sides of the lopsided sphere.

"You dragged me away from the cabins to help you build a snowman?_ This_ is your problem that only I could solve?"

Emmett jumped down and grinned at me. "Don't get your panties in a bunch, old man. We'll get back in plenty of time for your weekly dose of _Touched by an Angel_. I need your help blowing the big guy up when Carlisle finds out about him."

I looked at the now perfect circle and nodded appreciatively. "What are you thinkin'? Cannon, explosives, or dynamite?"

"I can't decide." Emmett began the even hand strokes that he used to create the base snowball. "I'm hoping he gets over sixty feet, so we could use a bunch of different stuff. We can take a break from unpacking and come have some fun."

"A fun family event?" I asked a bit bitterly. We weren't supposed to be in Alaska right now, but once again, my weakness forced us to move. We should have been in Forks by now, facing down werewolves of some kind, or happily staying far too long in Rochester, but we were now in the vast Alaskan wilderness, where I wasn't likely to hurt anyone. My failure once again brought this on us.

"Yeah, kinda like that. We all need a good dose of explosive fun sometimes," Emmett said. He looked at me and then motioned his head to a couple of hills. "And an epic snowball fight."

"It won't help." I watched appreciatively as he pushed the small ball around until it was just a bit smaller than the first. Emmett was gifted in this kind of stuff.

"Look, Jasper, Rose is upset, sure, but we were there way too long as it was. We've never stayed anywhere more than six years, and we all knew it was time to move, even Rosalie, though she wouldn't admit it. Besides, you didn't actually kill anyone, just scared them a little. Hell, I've still forced us to move more times than you."

I snorted.

"It's true, and you know it," he continued. "No one died. That's pretty good for our kind."

I grimaced and remembered that night just nine days ago. The city of Rochester was nestled among the hills and forests of New York State. We had no lack of food, but we did lack privacy and empty hunting grounds. There were people everywhere.

"Doesn't make much difference, does it?" I looked at him and waved my hand to the wide snowfield. "We still had to move here just to be safe." I kicked at the snow, which exploded into a white cloud. "And it was two times."

"That first time didn't count. We caught you_ way_ before you did any damage." When I didn't say anything, he continued. "None of us really mind spending a few years in Alaska. Carlisle loves to fly that little plane to the isolated areas. I think he feels needed here. We all get our own log cabins, and the food is good. We can play like we want because there's no one here." He waved his hand to indicate the vast wilderness.

I grimaced. _No one here_. That's exactly the reason we came, because I couldn't stand to be close to humans like we were in Rochester.

"Come on, Jasper. I've made us move six times, and you've only done it three, four if you count that Maria thing, but that was her fault if you think about it."

"But I'm eighty years older than you, so my numbers need to be better than yours," I reminded him.

"I've been a practicing vegetarian for longer," Emmett said.

"You mean cheating vegetarian."

"That, too." He grinned at me, and then his eyes narrowed. "You're kind of cute when you pout. It reminds me of Edwa-"

I was on top of him before he could finish.

One of the best things in life is a good old-fashioned wrestling match. Especially one you can't lose.

Within minutes, his shirt was shredded, my pants were ripped down one side and we were both laughing.

"Edward put you up to this?" I asked, tossing a snow chunk at Emmett's head. It stuck there.

Emmett knocked off the snow and grinned. "No, not really. Esme did." The grin lessened. "Edward doesn't care about much of anything. Not anymore. He—"

"Yeah I know."

The grin returned. "The snowman was totally my idea, though."

He faked a roundhouse kick and came at me low instead. I back flipped out of the way.

"And it's a good one, too. Might just help you build it."

"I don't need your help to build it. You seriously suck at snow packing. I need you to help me blow it up." Emmett dodged two quick punches and deflected my kick.

"You're getting the hang of this fighting stuff. Maybe in a century or so, you'll be good at it." I gave him my three-strike combo and then swept his legs out from under him. "So, you aren't mad and Rose will get over this?"

"Eventually." Emmett stood and dusted himself off. "She would have stayed in Rochester forever, if she'd been able to. Look, we needed to leave. Those kids making out by Lake Eerie did us a favor. It was time we moved, bro."

I closed my eyes and thought about the small group of lovers. I did indeed scare them, but that was all. They heard the sound of thunder as two stone bodies tackled mine and then my enraged roars and assumed I was a bear. At least that's what Edward said.

But that was the second time in two years that I'd slipped, and our family couldn't take the chance.

"I'm just tired of being the weak link in the chain."

I took up a lump of snow and began gently pressing it into a ball firm enough to become a massive head. It fell apart in my hands.

"Not like that," Emmett chided me. "Like this." He held up both hands and made a squishy motion with his fingers.

"Nice."

"It works, I'm telling you."

"I'm telling Rosalie you just compared her best feature to a snowman," I said with a laugh.

A prick of true panic shot from Emmett. "You wouldn't!"

I laughed again and hit him square in his now shirtless chest with a mound of firm snow. It stuck right where I'd intended. "You're right!" I crowed. "It's just like a breast."

Emmett looked down and blinked. I made sure to memorize this moment to show Edward. It would be a relief to lift his mood even if only for a moment.)

"I feel so lopsided," Emmett said touching the perfect white orb stuck to his chest. "Wait. Damn you! You're going to share this, aren't you?"

I took off at a dead run. "Thanks for making me feel better," I called as I flew over the soft snow.

Family. It can be a wonderful thing. Sometimes.

_**Hoh National Forest, August, 2003**_

_**Alice**_

Jazzy scanned the thick trees around us, his need to protect me heightened in the overgrown forest. His head snapped around every time a branch moaned under the weight of the heavy mist.

It was very sweet and completely annoying.

"Relax," I cooed to him, hoping he would do just that. "Nothing happens."

"What exactly do the words 'nothing happens' mean to you?" asked Rosalie.

"It means what it says." I sighed, again. "It means that I don't see anything happening. As in nothing." Nothing at all. Nothing would change here. I let my eyes flick to Edward. For the moment he was concentrating on hearing any enemy that might sneak up on us in whatever form they took.

His handsome face showed no sign of any emotion, and that made my heart ache. Nothing new, nothing changing, no hope.

I saw Edward's mouth twitch down and I sought the future rather than dwell on my lonely brother.

"But you're sure we go back to the house?" Jazzy asked. "That part is clear?"

I whirled on him, and he backed away. I'd spent the last two days trying to see this meeting, but nothing clear appeared. The tribal leaders obviously hadn't made up their minds if they'd meet us or not. The only reason we came out to this wet, dripping woods was because Carlisle had told them we'd be here.

Other than avoiding our own kind, I'd never had to be cautious of anyone else. It felt strange to think about an enemy that could do us harm, but according to Carlisle, these wolf-men could rip us apart.

Jazzy almost refused to come to the Olympic Peninsula, and he only agreed after I had assured him that I saw nothing.

The problem was that I really didn't see anything. As in, nothing. At all. I felt like I had blinders on when my family needed me most. To make up for it, I tried harder. Yet, the more I tried, the more odd and hazy the visions became.

It made my head pound.

I paused and looked again, but saw only our futures and not that of the tribal elders.

"We still go back to installing the window barriers and repairing the siding," said Edward as he saw what I did.

"We have _such_ exciting lives," Emmett mumbled.

"Perhaps the wolf men are dead," suggested Esme. "None of us caught their scent yet."

"Maybe they're just scared." Rosalie looked out over the river to where she'd watched Carlisle sign the peace treaty with the tribe so long ago.

"We're vampires. They have reason to be scared," Edward reminded her. "This is what all humans would want to do to us if they knew of our existence."

Just then the briefest flash of red entered my mind.

"You're kidding," Edward snapped. "Did you see that old thing?"

"Of course I saw it. It was in _my_ head."

"Care to share?" Jasper's tone and stance showed he was not amused.

"It's that red truck she saw back in Seattle in the fifties. One of the tribe members must have bought it." Edward said.

"Wait,_ that _truck?" Emmett asked. He grinned at me. "Damn, Little Bit, you _are_ good."

"You never cease to amaze me," said Carlisle with a smile. "Fifty years is a long time for a vision to remain true."

"I can see a truck for fifty years, but I can only barely make out the human driving it. That's not so amazing," I said, still upset with my fickle visions. It irked me that the members of the tribe were so hard for me to see. Humans were bad enough, but these humans barely registered in my visions at all.

"Maybe that means they don't cross our paths, which is a good thing," Edward assured me.

"How soon will they be here?" asked Jazzy. He moved closer to me, his eyes locked on the path to the road.

"Ten minutes," I said, more guessing than foreseeing.

"Everyone relax, please," Carlisle said to our group.

All of us except Carlisle stood in the complete stillness our stone bodies preferred and waited for the sound of the truck. Carlisle fidgeted. The human motions were so ingrained now that his perfect mind didn't even register the fact.

The only sounds around us now were the noises of water dripping in its constant almost-rhythm and Carlisle's minor movements. Within a moment, however, the deep and irregular growl of a truck engine told us of the elders' coming.

"That thing sounds terrible," said Rosalie. "I have no idea how it's still running."

"It would be fun to rebuild a truck like that. It sounds like it has most of the original parts," Emmett said appreciatively. "Maybe they'd be willing to sell it to us."

Everyone turned and looked at him.

"Or not," he mumbled.

Jazzy snorted and rolled his eyes. Emmett's casual approach to life annoyed my mate no end.

However, his comment did ease the tension among us. All except for Edward, who still stared blankly out at the forest.

The heavy lumbering of the truck stopped, and we heard the sound of three humans walking through the thick debris on the forest floor, two of them limping. They walked more quietly than most humans, their feet barely making noise on the forest floor, but still, it sounded ridiculously loud in the forest.

"They don't exactly seem threatening," whispered Jazzy when the humans came into sight.

Even at a distance, the men looked old and weak to my predator's eyes. Easy prey. Ridiculously easy.

"Thank you for coming." Carlisle's gentle voice rose clearly over the hushed sounds of the forest around us.

The three men froze. It was only then that I realized they didn't carry flashlights like most humans. They relied on the thin light of the moon to see.

"Neither my family nor I will harm you in any way," Carlisle continued. "I am willing to meet you on your side of the river, if you would prefer."

The thinnest one raised his head, as if in defiance. His white hair almost glowed in the thin moonlight. "Stay where you are, Cold One."

The men continued to approach the edge of the river, watching us the whole time. They stopped just behind a fallen log at the river's edge.

"I'm Quil Ateara. My grandfather and father met you and agreed to the peace treaty on those rocks." He pointed to the very spot Carlisle and his family had once stood. "This is Billy Black, the grandson of Ephraim Black." Quil pointed to a broad man who leaned heavily on a cane and then to a large man with white streaked hair. "And this is Harry Clearwater. We are the elders of the tribe, and we have the full knowledge of our heritage and our enemies."

"I never was, and will never be your enemy," Carlisle replied. "I and my family have kept the treaty for almost eighty years and will continue to do so."

"Your family has grown. How is that, since you promised to bite no one?" demanded the one called Billy. His face and stance showed his anger at our presence.

A stronger wave of peace drifted through the forest.

"These two joined our family on their own. We did not create them," Carlisle assured him. "In fact, they followed our diet even before they joined us, so they pose no threat."

"Your kind is always a threat." Billy nearly growled the words. "Had we known you would bring more, my grandfather Ephraim would have never allowed you to live."

"Yet Ephraim did allow them to live." Harry sighed and looked up at the dark sky. "We can't go back on his treaty without reason." The old man looked from Billy to Carlisle. "Will you live in the white house by the river and work in Hoquiam again?"

"We will live in the same house, but I will work in the Forks hospital and the younger ones will attend the high school there."

All three men stiffened at Carlisle's words.

"Forks is within a few miles of the reservation," Quil said. The anger in his voice bordered on rage.

"You can't do that," said Billy. His strong voice echoed off the trees with the force he put behind it. "Our people use that hospital!" Billy pointed his finger at Carlisle as he continued. "And some of our children attend the school. You have no right to do that to us, Cold One. You'll drive us from our town and keep us from health care."

Once again, Jazzy shoved calm into the space between us. It was so forceful I heard Emmett sigh.

Carlisle put his hands up in a sign of peace. "We are no threat to your children, and you are still free to use the hospital and clinic in Forks. We simply want to live in the area for a few years, and then move on, as is our way. We will not harm you or your tribe."

Esme came and stood by Carlisle. "We don't want to cause you any trouble." I could tell the elder's attitude hurt her. Esme, more than any of us, wanted to live in peace and to make whatever she touched lovely in some way. The idea that she would knowingly harm anyone upset her. "We simply wish to live here for a while. We need this place for such a short time. It won't cause your people any harm."

"Your very existence harms us, Cold One," Quil said icily. He pointed a swollen and crooked finger at her accusingly. "You by nature are an enemy to all living things. It is your nature to destroy whatever you touch. We will honor the treaty, but you will not have contact with our people in any way."

Carlisle moved closer to Esme, partially blocking Quil's view of her. Even if this old man couldn't hurt her physically, we all knew his words wounded her.

Why would Carlisle bring us to a place where we'd be so hated?

"We're always hated," Edward hissed. "These people simply know _why _they hate us."

Even after Jazzy flooded the forest with peace, all three men looked furious. I looked yet again to the future, and saw nothing new, except that Emmett was going to destroy one of the expensive metal window guards Edward had designed. I wondered briefly which one of us would dare him to test the strength of Edward's invention.

"Focus," Edward growled almost silently.

"We will also honor the treaty and won't have any contact with your people," Carlisle said. I could hear resignation in his voice. "You have my word. My family will avoid all contact with your tribe and none of us will violate the land treaty for any reason."

He sounded almost sad.

_Did he really expect to make friends with them?_

Edward nodded infinitesimally and gave a slight roll of his eyes. Only Carlisle would hope to befriend our natural born enemies.

"It isn't enough," Billy whispered to the older one. He leaned heavily on his cane, his knuckles white and his hands shaking. "It will only take one of them to bring disaster upon us all. _Only one_. They can't be trusted."

"They can't be stopped, either," the one called Harry hissed back. "One of their kind nearly destroyed our entire tribe. We have no hope against seven. We must trust the treaty."

"You're willing to risk the safety of our people on an old piece of parchment?" Billy asked him. "The treaty isn't enough to stop any of them."

"Nevertheless, we are bound by our honor to keep the treaty." Quil said. He never took his eyes from us, and didn't bother to whisper.

Except for a small tribe in the Amazon, I'd never been around humans who knew so much of us. It made me feel a bit naked to have a human understand our nature so well.

"And I am bound by my honor to keep it as well," Carlisle said. "We will not destroy anyone. In fact, while we are here, we will defend the entire Olympic Peninsula from both our own kind, and any other dark ones who travel here."

"We don't need or want your protection. Stay away from our people and those in Forks. Bite no one, and when your time is done, leave." Quil looked angrily at us. "Leave and do not return."

"We will abide by the treaty. That is all I will promise," Carlisle said.

For a moment it looked as if the three men might say more, but with a final glare, Quil turned from us and the other two elders followed.

No one moved until the roar of the truck's engine began to fade in our perfect, stone ears.

"Well that was different," Jazzy said at last.

"Told ya," Emmett said with a grin. "Though I didn't get even a whiff of dog smell. I was hoping you'd get to experience that."

"Edward?" Carlisle asked.

"The tribe no longer shifts into wolf form," Edward said with an indifferent shrug. "They don't understand why it has happened, but without the wolf form, they know they're helpless."

"That's unexpected but welcome news." Carlisle nodded slowly. "It also explains their reaction to us. They feel utterly unprotected and afraid. They know exactly what we are, and they understand what we can do."

"They have good reason to hate us with every fiber of their beings," Edward said. "But their fear and hatred of us goes deeper than their knowledge."

"Yeah, I got that part," Emmett said.

"It's almost a mindless, instinctual fear," Jazzy mused. "Like they were born to hate us."

"I wouldn't wonder if they were," Carlisle said. "I would love to study them and perhaps help them understand their heritage better, but I doubt I will ever have the chance." He looked around at us all. "Now that you know what we face, do you still want to live in Forks? We can still leave and return to Eugene, or perhaps Portland."

"I love this place," Esme said quietly. "There's something very freeing here under the constant cloud cover, and the forest and mountains are so beautiful. I want to stay, even if it's only for a few years. Perhaps the next time we return, the tribe will no longer remember us."

"We shouldn't have any problem avoiding the tribe," agreed Rosalie. "We have no real reason to come into contact with them. Once they leave the high school and hospital, it will be easy."

"I never wanted to force them out of their home," said Esme sadly. "It's a pity they won't let their tribe use the hospital or the school with us here. I don't want to drive them from the town."

"No," agreed Carlisle. "I'd hoped we could live amicably, but it seems they refuse to trust us. I can't blame them, of course."

"It's their decision, not ours," said Jazzy. "You shouldn't feel guilty about the choices others make."

"It's not like we'll be here long, anyway," Rosalie agreed.

"We'll be gone in four years." Emmett looked up at the moon. "Four short years. This town's like all the others, and we'll be nothing but an odd memory while the humans go on with their lives. Just like always."

"Just like always," Edward repeated without inflection.

My silent heart ached for him. For Edward, nothing ever changed. This was yet another school to endure, another series of hunting trips, another series of relentless nights and listless days.

"Don't you dare look," he hissed with a baleful glare at me.

I looked to his future anyway, hoping that this once, I might see something, or someone, new. In the briefest flash I saw the old truck parked by our home.

_How did that happen?_

Edward laughed grimly at me. "Either you're slipping, or Hell is going to freeze over. There's no way that will ever happen."

"It's only a possibility," I reminded him.

"No, it's not a possibility and you know it. It's nice to know you are fallible. Makes you more likeable."

"What?" Jazzy cocked his eyebrow in his slightly annoyed way.

"She saw that old, red truck parked at our home," Edward said with an irritated snort. "Apparently, the tribe pays us a visit."

"You're kidding," said Rosalie incredulously. "There's_ no_ way one of those dogs would sit in our home and chat with us. Do you know how badly our house would stink afterward?"

"I think all the stress has fried your little brain." Emmett reached over and tousled my hair.

I growled at him.

"Maybe if you didn't try to see into places where your mind doesn't belong, you wouldn't see ridiculous things like wolf-men coming over for tea." Edward practically glowed triumph.

"Regardless of how, um, unlikely, the scenario is, we will keep the vision in mind as we prepare the house," said Carlisle, ending our banter. "We will want to make it as impenetrable as possible."

I grinned at Edward. "Maybe we should test the new walls and windows." If Edward was going to be so annoying, I'd make sure something tonight went my way.

"That's a great idea," Emmett said a little too enthusiastically. "I bet it can't stand against my roundhouse."

I gripped Jazzy's hand and smiled broadly at him. "Let's get back to the house. We have a lot to do before school starts."

I looked back at Edward who hadn't moved, and smirked as I replayed the fight he and Emmett would soon have. It would set our repairs back at least a week.

_See? Your window guards do work. Almost._

Edward glared darkly at me as I skipped beside my mate.

_**Tuesday, January 18th 2006**_

"What will she look like?" Rosalie asked tonelessly. The monotonous green and gray flew past us as Edward effortlessly maneuvered the car around the corners. After two years, and with the ability to see the road through our eyes, he could literally do it with his eyes shut.

In fact, he'd done it several times before.

He glanced over at me.

"Might be fun to try again," he said with a shadow of a smile. Rosalie had thrown a fit when she discovered why Jasper and Emmett were so interested in the road.

I automatically began looking ahead to our day, keeping my mind off my emotions, while I inwardly ached for my brother. He hated our pity even more than the hollow, endless boredom of his existence.

My first glimpse showed me that horrid truck with a tiny, terrified girl behind the wheel. I laughed and even Edward snorted.

All eyes turned on me. "You know that God-awful truck Billy Black had? Chief Swan must have bought it off of him because the girl will drive to school in it today."

Silence followed. There wasn't much to talk about, and the presence of yet another hormonal, human adolescent was hardly cause for celebration. The rain hit the Volvo's windows with its monotonous rhythm that matched the monotonous place perfectly.

I longed for days spent in the warm sun, and yet I loved the freedom the rain gave us.

"Will there be any sun anywhere this weekend?" Edward asked me. He glanced at Jasper and then flicked his eyes unnecessarily back to the road. I looked to the future quickly, but saw nothing of concern for Jasper. Edward and I both knew how hard this week would be for him, and how dangerous. He hadn't killed in nine years, but the three near mistakes he'd had since then hung between us like a weight. Two weeks was too long for him.

I settled back into my beautiful mate's side and looked around to the hunting grounds. "The Bitterroot Range will be sunny," I said with a slight smile. "Good, packable snow, too."

Emmett grinned. "Payback time," he said and punched Edward. Edward glared at him. "And you stay out of it this time!" He pointed back at me. Then he turned his attention to Jasper and his eyes narrowed. "And I haven't forgotten about the wrestling match."

The battle between the three males remained a constant of the family dynamic. I was grateful for it. We all were.

"I have. It was hardly memorable," said Jasper with a smirk. Jasper's seeming nonchalance about the all-important brotherly battles drove Emmett crazy.

"Edward doesn't need me to tell him the future when he can clearly read your mind," I reminded Emmett, more to change the subject than to start a fight.

"Doesn't matter. Getting visions of the future in his head is still cheating."

"Here we go again," mumbled Jasper into my hair as he kissed my head.

"I don't cheat," hissed Edward. Emmett grinned. Edward always took the bait.

"And I don't take bait." Edward glared balefully at me.

"Oh, yes you do, baby Bro, yes you do." Emmett grinned as he said it, and punched him again.

"For the last time, I'm older than you, you hick," Edward said. Emmett grinned wider, and they were off, fighting like the brothers they were.

x~X~x

Jasper took a deep breath as soon as we were away from the crowd of children. I looked ahead but again saw nothing. The school day was bad enough for him, but lunchtime was excruciating. It wasn't just the smell of blood, it was all the emotional chaos that flooded him which made it so hard. His new attempt at eating less often made it even worse.

"We could go to the library instead," I suggested as I wound my arm into his. He didn't answer, but instead walked towards the lunchroom. He hated appearing weak.

Several kids stopped to let us pass. I knew his face betrayed the pain he felt.

Just before entering, I pulled him down and smiled at him, giving my mate a peck on the cheek. I knew that the only reason Jasper put himself through all of this was to be with me. His days at school were nothing short of pure torture, but he came day after day, just to be by my side.

He looked down at me, and the thrill of our first love rushed through me. For a brief moment, I was in a diner in Philadelphia and I was seeing my beloved for the very first time.

Before I knew it, I was kissing him full on the mouth.

"Get a room," hissed Rosalie as she passed us.

"Or at least the janitor's closet," sniggered Emmett. "I suggest the one in the science building. The shelves are sturdier."

I stuck my tongue out at them, twirled under Jasper's arm, and entered that hellish place known as a school cafeteria.

The kids around us stopped and whispered or gave us condescending glances as we passed. The bitter tightness constricted in my chest for just a moment before Jasper loosened my pain. I'd long ago given up the idea of making a human friend, but that ache haunted me every day. It was so stupid.

Lunch went as it always did. We took the bare minimum of food. We made no eye contact. We didn't even speak much to each other simply because there was nothing left to say. I looked at tiny cracks in the brick walls or dirt on the windows and tried to occupy my endless, restless mind with anything I could.

That is until Edward let out the smallest of sighs. Beside me, Japer tensed.

_Edward? How is he holding up? _

Edward turned his lip down ever so slightly, and my cold body got a little colder.

I began searching our future, but all I saw was the school day, just as typical and monotonous as all the others.

_Is there any danger?_ Perhaps he could see or hear something I might miss. He slowly looked to the left and right, and I let myself relax.

_Let me know if it gets too bad._ He nodded with his eyes. No one knew of our conversation, though if the others were talking with him, I wouldn't know it either. Despite all his outward haughtiness and distance, Edward was a very good man deep inside. We all respected him and how he used his gift, or more correctly, how he didn't use it. His ability to know all our thoughts gave him immeasurable power over us, and yet he never used them against us.

_Thanks for doing this. _He hated listening as much as I hated looking, but we both knew it was necessary.

Jasper still annoyed Edward, and Edward still annoyed Jasper. I was still caught in between, but it was different now. They needed each other, they respected each other, and in their own way, each man loved the other as much as our kind can love. As Esme said, we each depended on the other, and the family was a family because of that dependence, even if some of us refused to admit it.

And we were complete. Each of us complemented the other. Each of us loved each other. A family in every way but by birth.

Almost a family.

I looked at Edward again and tried not to think about it.

The room shifted, and I saw Jasper lunge for Whitney. Before I could even tense, the vision shifted and I returned to see Edward kick Jasper's chair. I felt shame surge from my mate.

"Sorry," he mumbled at Edward. Edward shrugged it off, but I knew exactly what happened.

"You weren't going to do anything," I said quietly to him. "I could see that." I sent him my love and confidence, but it was met by turmoil surging within him.

"It helps a little if you think of them as people," I said, yet again. "Her name is Whitney. She has a baby sister she adores. Her mother invited Esme to that garden party. Do you remember?" I hoped that simple act of kindness would help him ignore the young girl. Jasper would do anything for Esme.

"I know who she is," Jasper said. I felt his shame redouble at my words, and I knew he'd had enough. He hated failing, especially when I could see it. He'd struggled so long with his demons, and yet we still had to watch him. It was unfair; he'd grown so much, given up so much, and it was all for me. I sighed and took my untouched tray and left.

I walked into the encroaching forest, waited for the bell and watched for danger. Sometimes the best thing I could give my mate was space and to keep him close only in my visions.

I stood in the dripping leaves and looked to the future, and so far nothing important was going to happen today. However, I knew how fast the future could shift in any direction. This afternoon, my attention would be totally focused on my mate.


End file.
